Dragon Age: Origins

[Beev]

I enjoy the AI to an extent. I know it's something basic, but I like that the AI will use the big aoe fire spell if my guys are all clumped up. CC is definitely the "smart" thing to do, but it just isn't fun to lose complete control of your character for so long. I have that beef with WoW too.

Edit: And yeah, there's so much lore. I'd love to just sit and read it sometime.

 

[SacrosanctFiend]

Wonderful game, albeit a bit short if you don't play each origin all the way through. On my second playthrough as an Elven mage.

 

[Drako]

I'm loving this game so far. I'm still on my first play through as an Elf Mage, and have about 40 hours in. There are some really good side quests that really add to the story line.

 

[sourceninja]

Now that I'm playing on the PC, I absolutely love this game. I'm playing as a human mage and have finally caught up to where I was story wise with my human warrior on the 360.

Now what to do with my 360 copy?

 

[iamwiz82]

I hate to use internet memes to describe things, but the battle scene at Ostagar was epic.

 

[Schadenfroh]

Now that I'm playing on the PC, I absolutely love this game.

Now what to do with my 360 copy?

Game exchange thread:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=228713

 

[IamDavid]

Very good game. Took a while to get into it since I haven't really played a game like this since BG2. I recommned it to everyone.

Any word on major expansions/add-ons in production?

 

[Looney]

Yeah i love it on the 360. I love that i can just sit back in my bed and play on my 42" plasma. I also love the tactics options for the party members, i rarely even have to micromanage my groups thanks to that.

Here's a hint to make the group much more effective.
Create a tactics that is set to Enemy: Target of Player Character (or whoever you want everybody to assist), and set it to Attack. Set that as the very last tactics, and your party will focus their damage on whoever you have targeted.

I actually like to set Wynne to use her Shattering Rock (i think that's what it's called) instead of Attack, since i usually start the fight with Cone of Cold or Winters Grasp, and she usually shatters whatever i have frozen immediately.

I just wish there were more tactics slots, at least for the beginning of the game.

Anyways, fantastic game. Did first run through on Hard, and trying Nightmare this time around. I don't like micromanaging the group, so i may need to dial it back to Hard again.

 

[Pheran]

I know I'm bumping an old thread, but this is the most "official" looking one I could find in the console forum. Just a heads up for any 360 owners still interested in DAO, some of the DLC is on sale this week (for gold members), including the big Awakenings expansion.

In other news, in October an "Ultimate" version of the game is coming out, which will probably bundle all the DLC. That could be a good deal if you haven't gotten the game yet.

Awakening - 1600 MSP (regularly 2400) - 33% off
Return to Ostagar - 240 MSP (regularly 400) - 40% off
Warden's Keep - 400 MSP (regularly 560) - 29% off
Blood Dragon Red Avatar T-shirt - 40 MSP (regularly 80) - 50% off

EDIT: Damn the stupid percent sign bug

 

[gorcorps]

Bumping this again as I just bought it. Best Buy has it on a bit of a markdown at $30 for either PS3 or 360. I grabbed the 360 version solely because it also gives a bonus armor in Mass Effect 2.

Only about an hour and 1/2 in, and I'm not sure what to think. I'm already pretty into the story, as expected with Bioware, but I'm not sure I like my character not having a voice. I guess I was just expecting the same thing as mass effect, where you're still in a dialog tree but your character actually says what you picked. It takes away from the immersion a tad to see it just be text only on your side.

 

[sourceninja]

Bumping this again as I just bought it. Best Buy has it on a bit of a markdown at $30 for either PS3 or 360. I grabbed the 360 version solely because it also gives a bonus armor in Mass Effect 2.

Only about an hour and 1/2 in, and I'm not sure what to think. I'm already pretty into the story, as expected with Bioware, but I'm not sure I like my character not having a voice. I guess I was just expecting the same thing as mass effect, where you're still in a dialog tree but your character actually says what you picked. It takes away from the immersion a tad to see it just be text only on your side.

I'm of the other side. By not speaking the lines I get two things.

1) I can voice my character in my head how I choose.
2) I don't have to listen to what I've already read.

 

[gorcorps]

I'm of the other side. By not speaking the lines I get two things.

1) I can voice my character in my head how I choose.
2) I don't have to listen to what I've already read.

I suppose... but in Mass Effect he didn't say exactly what you picked. You picked something that had a certain "attitude" and the Shepard would say something that conveys the same feeling but wasn't the same words. Hard to explain, but I really liked it because the voice acting was so good. Dragon Age is sure to be a much bigger game overall so it would have been more expensive to do it the same way, I just expected it I guess. If it wasn't for M.E. I wouldn't have thought about it as KOTOR was the same as DA and that didn't bother me. Not a deal breaker, just a thought.

The other thing that I noticed was that certain "beginning stories" seem to imply you're a very young character... but I chose to start as a casteless dwarf and I purposefully made him an older looking and gruff SOB. But then I talk to my mom, who looks quite a bit younger than myself (odd). Then I talk to another old dwarf who I look exactly like and I hear something like "well when you get to be my age...blah blah blah.. you young ones don't get it.... blah blah blah". If I had known I was supposed to be young, then that's what I would have went with. I liked making my own character, but it's again something that hurts immersion for me when I find out I basically made my character "wrong" for the story to make sense.

Small things that don't make a huge difference, but they're things I've noticed.

 

[sourceninja]

I suppose... but in Mass Effect he didn't say exactly what you picked. You picked something that had a certain "attitude" and the Shepard would say something that conveys the same feeling but wasn't the same words. Hard to explain, but I really liked it because the voice acting was so good. Dragon Age is sure to be a much bigger game overall so it would have been more expensive to do it the same way, I just expected it I guess. If it wasn't for M.E. I wouldn't have thought about it as KOTOR was the same as DA and that didn't bother me. Not a deal breaker, just a thought.

The other thing that I noticed was that certain "beginning stories" seem to imply you're a very young character... but I chose to start as a casteless dwarf and I purposefully made him an older looking and gruff SOB. But then I talk to my mom, who looks quite a bit younger than myself (odd). Then I talk to another old dwarf who I look exactly like and I hear something like "well when you get to be my age...blah blah blah.. you young ones don't get it.... blah blah blah". If I had known I was supposed to be young, then that's what I would have went with. I liked making my own character, but it's again something that hurts immersion for me when I find out I basically made my character "wrong" for the story to make sense.

Small things that don't make a huge difference, but they're things I've noticed.

My problem with mass effect style dialog is that sometimes I would pick a dialog option to have him say something that I didn't expect. I found it very frustrating, I'd like to know exactly what I"m going to say.

 

[Drako]

I'm of the other side. By not speaking the lines I get two things.

1) I can voice my character in my head how I choose.
2) I don't have to listen to what I've already read.

I agree with this as well. I'm kind of disappointed that Dragon Age 2 is going more with the Mass Effect style of game.

Also, if you do voice for a character that can be an elf mage, or a dwarf fighter, you would expect a pretty big difference in the voice acting. Doing that for all the possible character types in Dragon Age would be almost impossible.

 

[gorcorps]

More gripes:
-textures looks terrible, especially when the camera goes close in during the speaking parts

I know it sounds like I'm just railing on this game, but I'm still enjoying it quite a bit. I'm enjoying the story a lot and getting used to the combat system. The voice acting truly is top notch as always from bioware, and I'm finding myself going through everything in the dialog trees to make sure I'm not missing anything. I usually can't stand that much dialog/text in my games but it's all worth hearing so far.

I chose a melee class for my first go around, as I usually do that in most RPGs to get used to them before going with something more complicated. The game is so big though that I doubt I'll be able to get through it even once, let alone more with other classes... so I'm thinking of creating a new character that's magic based. I think I'd like the awesome AOE spells quite a bit.