Years ago, Bioware and EA brought the world Dragon Age Origins. DAO was a game that took the core gameplay from the Knights of the Old Republic series and implemented it into a medieval time period that allowed you to control multiple soldiers, make choices that would affect your adventure and all with a role-playing game backbone attached.
Dragon Age Origins was epic on so many damn levels. The story featured warriors battling against a re-emerging enemy called the ‘Dark Spawn’, which are basically undead creatures abiding by the orders of their masters, which were demons. You played as a ‘Grey Warden’, a rare race of people, who could stop the dark spawn and their masters. The story alone created some fantastic cinema that helped keep the game going and interesting.
Fast forward a year later and we get Dragon Age 2. While the core ideas were along the same line, the execution and game elements were not even close to DAO. Area restriction kept the game tight. Too much emphasis on small side quests, while way too heavy on the political side. This game was nothing like the original and not good enough to say it was just a different direction. To be quite honest, this one felt pretty damn rushed.
Anyway, it’s 2014 and EA/Bioware have been marketing the hell out of Dragon Age: Inquisition game prior to its launch. It promises to go back to what made the first so ‘magical’ (couldn’t find a better word, the coffee hasn’t quite kicked in this morning) and, more importantly, memorable. It marketed the possibility of large lands to explore, endless side quests and a compelling story to keep you moving forward. All of this on top of a crazy character customization system, a competent leveling system and a strong online co-op multiplayer function. They promised all of these things on Dragon Age’s first attempt at current generation hardware.
These are promises they’ve made before, so call me skeptical.
Well, they were right. They were soooooo right.
Dragon Age: Inquisition is absolutely everything EA and Bioware had promised. The story starts out with your main character waking up after a gigantic explosion that has killed a high ranking official — and you’re the only survivor in the building. Upon waking, the main character has a power embedded in his hand that is meant to help close terrible rifts (openings to the other side where demons reside), which becomes the pivotal plot device to not only see you survive from the clutches of angry town folks, but also eventually puts you in the leadership forefront when the land decides to form an inquisition to investigate what went wrong and whom is to blame (and how to save the world from tearing itself apart from the rifts). On top of all this, there is an ongoing war between the mages (formerly slaves) and the templars (formerly slave owners), which makes a nice connection back to the first game. I don’t want to get too much into the story because I want you to unravel the goodness yourself, but just know that this is one of the strong points to the game. While I wouldn’t put it on the same pedestal as Dragon Age Origins, it’s far and away better than the previous DA title.
That’s really just the tip of the iceberg with this game.
The gameplay elements involved are structured the same way as the previous titles. You command a core group of four players, each featuring different strengths and weaknesses, and switch between them as you fight. The game is broken down into the following classes:
Rogue — Scrappers of the group. They can wield things like a crossbow or have dual-wielding capabilities (two daggers, anyone?). Quick and concise with their fighting, they’re good to have in a group — especially, if you need a lock picked.
Warrior — This is the character I made for the game. Two-handed weapons or one-handed weapons/shield. There is a large variety of different weapons for this class to choose from. The brutishness of this class makes for a fun time, at least I think so. No regrets.
Mage — The mage can heal, cause great damage through different elements and basically sit back in a fight and enjoy the view without getting too involved. I know a lot of gamers that enjoy this class, but I am not one of them. They are a necessity on the battlefield, though. Lots of magic and choices to choose from when it comes to fighting styles.
On the level tree side of the table, each class is going to have an enormous amount of leveling decisions to choose from. Each tree is broken into the following categories:
Abilities – This is where the magic happens. You get to decide on your tree path in this category, depending on what class you’re playing. The leveling tree here is deep, expansive and fun to choose different methods of fighting. The leveling is fast and furious, though around 14-15 it all starts slowing and arching a bit.
Tactics – This allows you to enable/disable tactic abilities for characters. For example, if you want to enable the block and slash ability, but disable another — you can do that here. You also get a nice detailed description on each ability’s usage.
Attributes – While there isn’t anything to adjust in this category, you get a nice summary of how your character is developing as the game is progressing.
Behaviors – This allows you to adjust the type of behaviors your NPC team has as they battle along side of you. This is kind of cool, as you can help dictate how your other characters react in certain situations. For example, if you want to limit on potion consumption or put a limit on when they can use a potion, you can do that here. It’s a nice set of options that offer more customization.
These categories might be the same by name throughout each class, but each class brings its own unique set of abilities with the categories. For example, the main character, the inquisitor, has an ability called the ‘Mark of the Rift’. This creates a circle on the battlefield and anything within that circle has its energy drained by a rift the main character opens. It’s a whacky-ass ability that is so much fun to use, but the recharge time for it is long. If you’re new to the series, there is a recharge time for every ability in the game. Anyway, each character sports powerful abilities to make fighting life easier.
Now, each one of these classes comes with a set of additional attributes that help out in different ways. For example, the warrior can actually bash through walls (that’s kinda fun), while the mage can bring down magical barriers that might be keeping the group from progressing. The best combination on the battlefield is to have a little bit of everyone because you will run into situations that require these attributes. I had a situation where I didn’t bring a rogue with me and I couldn’t complete a mission without having some doors unlocked. A little inconvenient? Yes, but it made me think about my colleagues and their uses as the game progressed.
Speaking of colleagues, one feature that Bioware is particularly proud of in Dragon Age: Inquisition is the advanced combat tactics mode. By pressing the touchpad on the PlayStation 4 gamepad, the game goes to an overhead/isometric viewpoint that allows you to pick and choose how the individual parts of your team are going to act and react during battle. It also allows you to assign purpose to them on the field of battle. I know that PC folks are going to go nuts over this new addition and I can see how it works well for them, but for me, a lowly console gamer, I maybe used this once or twice during gameplay. You’re essentially getting a real-time strategy element in an action game. It works well for this type of game, but not enough to peak and keep my interest. It’s a personal preference, not a ‘doesn’t function well’ sort of thing. I’m not a complicated gamer when it comes to Dragon Age games. As someone put it on Twitch the other day, ‘Stop treating this like a third-person action game, you ****’. My response? No. I excelled the first time around in DAO with my current gameplay type and I won’t deviate from that type of gameplay.
In short, the advanced combat tactics mode is damn cool and lots of people will adore it, but I just couldn’t get into it.
Shifting gears slightly, the actual story is dictated by what’s on the war table of the game. The war table is your central point to stay on task with the inquisition storyline, as well as find missions and side quests to complete. The table is broken into two areas:
Scouting Operations – Scouting operations are interesting. It’s basically a card game. You choose your fellow companions from the war table, whom all have different types of influence (political, military, etc.). The scouting operations have certain small storylines on them and depending on that storyline, you choose your best person to go handle things. How they handle them means certain types of rewards for completion. You don’t really have to do anything to get these accomplished other than choose the most appropriate person for the situation. It’s a different way of doing things and adds some value to the table.
Missions – The missions is what you would expect from typical DA gameplay. Missions allow you to participate in major storyline plot point progression or smaller missions that are related to the storyline. Missions can be opened by players ‘claiming’ spots with a banner during major missions. For example, I was in the Hinterlands and I found several spots that I put banners on, which opened up smaller side quests that were related to the main story. I’m praying there will be no stories that turn me into a vampire (kidding, kidding — that’s Skyrim). You will spend a shitload of time here.
As you progress with the missions and scouting operations, you can also earn the inquisition perk points. The perk points can be applied to four categories (Forces, Secrets, Connections, Inquisition). These perks expand the inquisitions capabilities and help to make the game a bit more fun and manageable. I found the perk points interesting, though they are slow moving to earn. They do add another level of complexity to the Dragon Age: Inquisition universe. They make it more than just an action game, as you have to think more about the group than you do about yourself.
The war table also allows you to explore lands and find objects that you may not have run into during missions. Picture this as your chance to go enjoy some open world action. This also brings you some additional items of interest, especially for those gamers out there that thoroughly enjoy crafting. You are sent on side quests to pick up certain plants, objects and find elements to craft items and become proficient in creating some of your own solutions in the game. I found it particularly interesting how you can pick up plants in the game and acquire their seeds to grow your own vegetation. While I have to admit that I am not obsessing over doing that, I think it’s pretty cool that you can grow your own goods.
Anyway, the brilliance of this game is the little things you run into and the complex state of customizing, exploring and using your inquisition group the best way possible. The gameplay is built to be deep and also flexible for those gamers that don’t want a deep experience. It reminds me a lot of Skyrim, though I won’t dare say they’re in the same category. Skyrim brought an enormously deep world that had large scope. Dragon Age: Inquisition has some depth to it, though not on the Skyrim level when it comes to the scope of the world. What it lacks in enormity, it makes up for in complexity. Bioware did their homework to make this game universally useable for any sort of gamer wanting to pick it up. It has about everything you want in terms of gameplay, though it doesn’t depend on everything for progression. You’ll spend 40-50 hours playing the main story, though exploring and doing side quests will take you into the triple digits — and that’s before the DLC, which I’m sure is going to be on the way not too long after launch on the 18th.
Wars, goods and strategy aside, what about the enemies? Love the artificial intelligence from the baddies. While the repetition of the enemies is pretty thick when you’re jumping from land to land (meaning you’ll find a certain type of enemy in a certain land and continually see that group of enemies whilst there), they’re not cheesecake to get rid of during gameplay. They’re vicious little bastards that don’t hold back when they’re fighting. Groups of any type of enemy can be tough and if they gang up on you, and they will, which could lead them to kick your ass easily.
Now, when you get to the bosses, you’ll find long, drawn out battles that require some sort of strategy — depending on the boss. For example, I went into a certain land where I had to fight a fellow that wanted to challenge the inquisition to a fight. It took forever to bring the guy down, and his minions were pegging us with arrows from the background. You won’t find any boss fight that will seem like a grind, depending on your level at the time of battle, but they will usually take around 15-20 minutes (again, depending on your level) to complete.
Having said that, such a statement changes when you go up against a dragon. I worked for nearly 30 minutes on two separate occasions to get nearly halfway to killing one of those beasts — and I was at the same level as them! I have yet to take down a dragon in the game. It’s probably my lack of tactical prowess, but it’s tough to beat the scaley beasts. Their intelligence and movement during battle can be disruptive and tough to deal with/get straight. For example, there was a dragon in the desert that not only was setting my folks on fire, but also determining whom amongst my group needed to be kicked or slapped with its tail, depending how much damage each group member was laying down. It’s pretty cool to watch, though tough as nails. You will be in awe of their presence when you see them in motion, but will soon be reminded that it is a huge beast that likes flying and attacking. Brilliant to see in person, but hard as hell to bring down.
The single-player campaign of this game is the reason why you want it. It will last you for quite a while. It’s complex, fun and doesn’t waste a moment of its breath with boredom. This is a return to the first Dragon Age. Bioware got this one right and they have returned the series to where it needed to be.
On the multiplayer side of things, I didn’t get a chance to test it out due to the PlayStation 2.0 update. EA/Bioware said all will be well by the time the game launches, and I’m sure it will be because the co-op isn’t as complicated as say a Halo MP experience or CoD MP experience. I did jump into a co-op game solo (you can do that, but the enemies are too tough to overcome going solo), but I have yet to try the full experience. I will come back once the game launches and update this review, but from what I could see going solo, it’s typical co-op with huge levels and a real strong focus on teamwork. I can’t wait to see it in action with you folks on Tuesday.
Gameplay aside, let’s talk presentation. It’s f**king awesome. Starting with the environments, the draw distance on each map is just sickening good. For example, the most beautiful level I have run into thus far has been Storm Coast. You have a map that is surrounded by an angry ocean slamming into rocks and mountains. The depth of the mountains is pretty significant, as well as the sheer size of the map itself. It’s pretty wide and expansive. Bioware did a great job of making this particular land feel like an actual land that would exist somewhere. It’s just freaking huge.
Graphically, the environments are alive and kicking. You’ll find wildlife bounding in many places, leaves blowing here and there, as well as rain (like in Storm Coast) that makes everything wet around you (including your own armor). The amount of details, shading, shadows, lighting and environmental reaction is exquisite. You will find times where the textures are still rendering on levels, but once rendered they are quite gorgeous to admire. This is the beginning of what current generation games should look like in the next year or so. Bioware put everything they got into immersing gamers into these environments, and they pulled it off beautifully (as you can see below).
As for the character models, the in-game stuff is cool. It all runs around 30fps (and I believe the PS4 is 1080p), even when you’re fighting groups upon groups of enemies. The details and reflections from the characters’ gear is fun to watch, especially when it reacts to the environment it’s in. Staying with characters, the cut scenes are just okay at best. I have seen better cutscenes this holiday season in current generation games (Call of Duty is still the best, though Will Johnson will claim it’s the Master Chief Collection), but the dialogue and reactions of the characters helps to forgive it a bit.
Overall, visually the game is gorgeous and everything you wanted it to be during gameplay. Audibly, the script, actor performances and depth of dialogue choices to go through will extend the presentation enjoyment, as will the fantastic orchestrated soundtrack. I might have to go track down the soundtrack, as it’s that good.
So, is it safe to say this is a fun game? God, yes. When this holiday season wraps up soon, I will be returning to this game for the holiday break. I will spend a lot of hours going through this and exploring lands and finding new things to enjoy about it. Folks, it has everything you want from a game. You have strategy, action, a great storyline, relatable characters and different choices to make each experience slightly different from the last. For example, I went from an action-packed Hinterlands mission to attending a party and searching for assassins before they completed their assassination (this required me to interrogate guests, pick up clues and break into rooms). Again, it has everything and it never gets boring.