Dragon Age: Inquisition - First Thoughts

Taken from my blog:


It’s like a really awkward date with someone ridiculously attractive and charismatic.

The character creation is astonishingly detailed in some areas, and lacking in others. I can adjust how shiny my lips are, which is awesome, but I can’t move said lips out or in on my face, leaving my character with perpetually outtie lips that make her look strangely apelike. And there are like ten hair meshes, and half of those are bald. I hope this game is easily moddable, because I want more hair and lip meshes. So many more.

And it’s awkward to control sometimes when you’re making your character, like you try to spin your character’s head and it keeps spinning even as you’re making changes. Tsk, tsk. Tacky.

So it has a learning curve. And when I say learning curve I don’t mean about consciously learning its buttons and commands, I mean like…it has a learning curve for its intuitive side, to get the feel of the game. So it’s an awkward date where you’re constantly missing on topic after topic until you start to get the feel of the person. The conversation does start to get smoother, though, and this person really starts to open up, however awkward and odd she is. Because she really is gorgeous and even kinda classy.

But very Hollywood. I’m not used to my games feeling this Hollywood.

12:43 - I’m running everywhere, and there’s no option to walk. You can open doors, but you can’t close them. Where’s the immersion?

13:01 - I’m so divided on this game, but I can’t help but love it, you know?

I absolutely adore the amount of strong women in the game. Little roles, like quartermaster, would be filled by big guys with a cockney accent in most games. Here, the role is taken by a big woman with a cockney accent. Sharp.

There’s a narrowness about the design of the game itself, something in the gameplay, that still smacks of that characteristic Bioware “you’ll play how we want you to” mentality, and I think that kind of mentality comes from making a game for a mass audience. True RPG fans chafe at it, but…if you’re trying to pull every gamer in, you might ignore diehard RPG features. But you know…Skyrim has spoiled me. I miss playing in a truly open world. Like, in this tavern. Its warm ambiance gripped me - the sun slanted low in the sky over a snowy mountain landscape - it was probably early morning. The wind blew through the windows and open door, whipping my cloak in the cold breeze. They did it so well I could feel it. This bard was playing this lovely song and I wanted to sit down on a chair for a minute, relax, and listen to it. But I couldn’t. The most I could do was run up to her, which seemed uncharacteristic in a warm, relaxing place like this tavern. A few guys were sitting at a table, talking quietly over mugs of ale. I wanted to do that, but I couldn’t.



It wouldn’t be so bad if they’d made a flat, bland world. But they made a gorgeous world of breathtaking beauty, a world that you can only enjoy in passing because the tools for immersion simply aren’t there. It’s tragic…and all the more so because I know Bioware/EA’s games are not easily moddable, and I’m unlikely to see features like these being made available with mods.

And yet…I’m still falling absolutely in love with this game. It’s like falling in love with a person that will only let you so far into their lives. It almost hurts.

14:24 - Remember in Oblivion and Skyrim when you'd have the opportunity to try out a lot of different weapons and combat styles during the tutorial? It gave you the opportunity to decide what you liked best. DA:I lacks this. Of course, I know…it's because you pick a set class and you don't really do that in Elder Scrolls. I just ran into a snag when, during the prologue, I wanted to switch over to a bow to see how I liked it, as opposed to the dual-dagger class I'd chosen at creation. The very next fight was a boss fight, and it didn't give me the option to open my inventory and change my weapon?! Ouch. I hope that's fixed in a future patch.

Sounds good but maybe a new section can be opened in the dragon age forum.
I think there is going to be a lot of activity.

I just asked Myrthos to set up a subforum for DA:I and move my thread there. Hopefully he gets the message soon. (or the first available admin that can do it! Jaz? Corwin? )

WTB: Blog Link

Originally Posted by Caddy
WTB: Blog Link

Hehee…alright.

http://emmascribbler.tumblr.com

Edit: I don't even think it's a week old so there's not a ton of content yet but there will be soon.

Nice start! More impressions, please.

Originally Posted by Thrasher
Nice start! More impressions, please.

Thank you!

Errr… Just try not to put too many spoilers as you progress please.

Of course, that doesn't mean romances. I'm expecting you to make several broken hearts in there!

You're right, Joxer, and I should have said that - this will be a spoiler-free look at the game. I tried to add "spoiler-free" to the thread's title but it wouldn't let me.

Originally Posted by Aubrielle
And it’s awkward to control sometimes when you’re making your character, like you try to spin your character’s head and it keeps spinning even as you’re making changes. Tsk, tsk. Tacky.

TIP about face creator:
In the character creator there is two systems to change facial features depending what they are. When on a slider you can easily turn the head and zoom with the mouse. When on the "adjust with axes" features, you can't really do that because the mouse is used to adjust the axes.

The best is to go on a slider choice and set the face in the angle that you want and then go on a "adjust with axes" feature to fine tune that one.

Originally Posted by Aubrielle
So it has a learning curve. And when I say learning curve I don’t mean about consciously learning its buttons and commands, I mean like…it has a learning curve for its intuitive side, to get the feel of the game. So it’s an awkward date where you’re constantly missing on topic after topic until you start to get the feel of the person. The conversation does start to get smoother, though, and this person really starts to open up, however awkward and odd she is. Because she really is gorgeous and even kinda classy.

Are you talking about Cassandra or the game there…

Also, I personally think there is a buttons and commands learning curve for K&M, keybinding is not like the previous games. I really suggest people take the time to keybind stuff to their liking.

Originally Posted by azarhal
Are you talking about Cassandra or the game there…

The game. I think my life is actually one big metaphor.

But that's excellent advice. And yeah, the sliders do work on two different axes, so that's definitely a new feature Bioware has added. I don't think I've ever seen this done before.

Wait a sec… There's a Tim Hortons in Ohio?

Oh yeah, there's lots. In central Ohio, anyway. I don't know what we'd do without it…

There were only Dunkin Donuts in Florida and I actually thought about reporting it to the UN as a human rights atrocity.

This is most excellent news. And here I thought keeping warm at Timmy's on game release nights was strictly a Canadian affair.

Originally Posted by Aubrielle
There were only Dunkin Donuts in Florida and I actually thought about reporting it to the UN as a human rights atrocity.

You visited FL and didn't stop by to say hi?

Originally Posted by JDR13
You visited FL and didn't stop by to say hi?

I lived in Tampa from 2010 to the end of 2012. If I'd been active on the Watch then, you'd definitely have received a visit from me!

Sorry but maybe you missed this under the key bindings but you can toggle auto-run (default is the G key):

I’m running everywhere, and there’s no option to walk

This is why the very first thing I do with every game is RTFM and go through every single menu in fine detail. They added a lot of options.

… that being said I am not yet in the game to verify if they actually work.

Originally Posted by wolfgrimdark
Sorry but maybe you missed this under the key bindings but you can toggle auto-run (default is the G key):

No, I totally didn't see this…! I'll definitely try this when I get back into the game in a little bit. Thank you!

Yeah I got my physical copy today! Boo, long game loading time. Ok, done ready to play but oops, day one patch? How big is it?

You visited FL and didn't stop by to say hi?

By the way JDR, its snowing and 8 degrees in Michigan. Don't you miss it?