March looks set to be a big month for games and two of the biggest hitters have released demos in the last few days. I've played 'em both on the PC and here are my musings:
Dragon Age 2 - (PC)
"Quick the darkspawn are on us we must run!" .....loading..... " another wave, stand and fight!" ....loading.... "now that's done, lets have a conversation"....loading....loading....loading.
Now I don't want to labour the point but seriously, what's with all the loading half way through things? It felt like I was trying to stream a video on a slow connection and was only getting 30 seconds at a time. Maybe that was just my computer, but it didn't really help with the flow of the story, having it interrupted every minute or so.
Petty gripes aside, the demo has really made me excited for the full game release (touted as March 11th). The original Dragon Age was a brilliant RPG with a dark theme and a fantastic storyline with a lot of choices that affected the flow of the game. It seems that it's sequel is adapting it's gameplay slightly but it's story seems as strong as ever. The demo covers the very earliest part of the story, our hero and his flight from the darkspawn, and then an early adventure upon his arrival as a refugee in Kirkwall. The differences between original and sequel are immediately apparent.
Some may be aggrieved that the choice of race has been removed from the game. This time around you are in control of one man (or woman) and his journey to becoming the champion of Kirkwall. There are again 3 classes on offer the staple Mage, Warrior or Rogue. The character alteration features were locked out on the demo but look extensive. If you like to mess with the size of your characters ears then you'll probably be in luck!
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| In the mind of a Dwarven story teller |
After character selection you are thrown straight into the story, as told by a dwarven Kirkwall resident who is one of the Champions companions. A Dwarf who it seems, is prone to exaggeration. Your first fight gives you all of your chosen classes best abilities to lay waste to the darkspawn threatening your family. As a Mage I was raining down fire and ice and clearing the field in seconds. However our storyteller is rudely interrupted in full flow and called out on his outrageous tales, and so the story is told again with a little more realism. Your first objective is to flee the Wilds and protect your mother from danger, along with your party consisting of your brother, a warrior, and your sister, a mage. In this first section the differences between the original and the inspiration behind these changes are most obvious.
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| probably to late to resolve this with talking.. |
Bioware clearly feel they've hit on a winning formula for a multi-platform RPG. The highly acclaimed Mass Effect 2 was the original, and Dragon Age 2 here follows suit. The camera angle hangs behind the controllable characters shoulders rather than the original more traditional RPG camera looking down upon the party from above. The conversation wheel from Mass Effect is also now present in Dragon Age, doing away with the ability to choose exactly what to say. Now a general mood or tone is selected from 3 options to direct the flow of conversation, choosing between an aggressive, peaceful or jokey tone. The action itself seems a lot more similar to Mass Effect than the original Dragon Age to me. The pause button, a staple of RPG games for as long as I can recall, is still present but feels wholly unnecessary here. It seems to me that the combat has been designed to be fast paced and frenetic and a chance to show off the graphical glory of the game.
Whilst these changes have slightly altered Dragon Age 2 from a traditional RPG to a more modern cross platform RPG-lite it's the story that has ultimately fuelled my anticipation for the the full title. With a decade of in-game time to work through I can't wait to see how the story develops and from the action seen in the demo it promises to pull no punches when it comes to darker themes!
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