[Arcana]

I actually have an internal debate between buying Dragon Age: Origins and Borderlands. A friend of mine is biased and recommends Dragon Age because he thinks it'll last longer and also because his studio worked on it (he works at as an art designer).

I've read brief reviews of both games but it's hard to get a sense of them.

Anyway this is really my excuse to start a Dragon Age: Origins thread. It comes out today (November 3) after all.

3... 2... 1... GO!

[GeckoYamori]

I made a Dragon Age thread here months ago, though no one cared. Now it's about to be released and is almost universally being praised as the best RPG since Baldur's Gate 2.

I've got it pre-ordered. For PC of course. The flexible toolkit is going to ensure a steady stream of mods for years, hopefully just as much as there is for Morrowind and Oblivion.

[Archaon]

I have to say, I'm kind of disappointed by the game's "Background" system. The way I heard it phrased, I was expecting more choices, or at least more freedom to choose. Instead it's just "You chose to be a human fighter, therefore your background is Human Noble." Granted, some class/race combinations might offer you a choice between two backgrounds, but it's still pretty underwhelming.

Speaking of lack of freedom, I'm also not best pleased about how the game pre-picks your starting skills for you. "You're a City Elf? OK, then you use dual weapons. No, you don't get to change it. This is MY character. I'm just letting you borrow it."

Now, I grant you that I am a real stickler for customization in RPGs, so maybe I'm overreacting. Heck, I only know this from playing with the character creator pre-release, so maybe it will have been changed in the final game. However, what with that and the infamous "SEX AND VIOLENCE!" trailer, I'm keeping my guard up. We'll see how it performs when it's out.

EDIT: Wait, what? It's out already? I could have sworn the last ad I saw said November 11th. THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING.

[Skummel Maske]

Hmm, basically what Archaon said about Dragon Age. Still, though, after trying Borderlands for an evening I'm not very impressed. I hope DA will be more interesting ;)

[Arcana]

I bought it just now, but since I just got home and I'm hungry I haven't started it yet.

A friend of mine tells me that it starts out really slowly, like mind-numbingly slowly and then ramps up into something pretty intense and epic. He compared it to the Lord of the Rings and how there's a lot that Tolkien describes about the shire and all of that until the black riders come along.

[RedFusion]

Just came home with the Collector's Edition, wooooooooo HOOOOOOOOOOO.

Came with the tin case and all. I paid a MASSIVE premium for it though ($120 AUD, which is equivalent to.. $108 USD at the moment) but there was nowhere else to get it.

Nonetheless, I just bought it as a treat to myself. And thankfully, the collector's tin case is pretty damn worth it. Much better than having a crappy plastic box, and for a game as epic as DA:O (hopefully) will be, then I think it will be a purchase well worth it. The cloth map is pretty cool too, and it's even better than Baldur's Gate II's cloth map (albeit smaller).

Anyway, won't be lucky enough to be able to play it until next thursday T_T, because of exam's and all. Oh well, it will be an agonizing wait.

And well, Borderlands, tbh I really don't see what all the hype is. It's just a grindy-type FPS with guns. And RPG elements. And no storyline.

Was really popular at launch, but I'm starting to hear of reports of Assassin's Creeditis, which is, well, repetitive gameplay. But it has multiplayer... but I think even L4D2 would be better for multiplayer co-op.

Considering DA:O's reviews: "Best RPG of the decade" etc, if it's remotely close to as good as Baldur's Gate II, then hell, it's worth buying imo.

[GeckoYamori]

Giantbomb review:
http://www.giantbomb.com/dragon-age-...20738/reviews/

I find it especially funny how he says it's so old school that it might come off as something new and forward-thinking to people who have been brought up with games like Oblivion and Mass Effect, due to their brutal streamlining of the genre over the years.

[Dunnowhathuh]

Been staring at the steam page for a while deciding whether I want it or not. Just doesn't appeal to me for some reason. Dunno, guess I'm just sorta over the whole medieval fantasy genre or something.

[Arcana]

I had the chance to play this for about an hour. You know what the first thing that struck me was?

"Damn, there's a lot of blood in this game."

There IS a lot of blood, it splatters all over the screen and after combat your character is covered in it. To me, it seems a little excessive and distracting.

Oh, the other thing I've noticed is that I kind of do enjoy these kinds of dialog games with multiple, small outcomes in which no "situation" you do is really right or wrong. A lot of other games I play, you either get no choices, or you're always supposed to do the "right" thing. That's not new news for Bioware, but it's one of those sighs of relief.

Oh, and the graphics in this game are not that good. Maybe it's because I just came from Aion, which has beautiful character models and very smooth animations for the most part, but Dragon Age's characters look terrible in comparison. The shoulders are too far apart relative to the bodies and the people don't really look relaxed and natural. I think this'll go away after a while but it does affect the immersion.

The voice acting on the other hand is not bad. Nothing stellar so far, but most of the voices are natural and delivered well. I kind of expected this since KOTOR was similar.

So far I'm not too far in and the story is pretty traditional, but it's interesting enough that I want to continue playing. The mechanics are not complex at all - you get to choose skills, some stats, and wear weapons, but combat isn't something you want to simply AFK out of, things will kill you if you don't take care of your party.

Need more time with the game.

BTW I never did play Baldur's Gate or NWN. The only other BioWare game I've played was KOTOR for XBox.

[GeckoYamori]

Got the game now. Just completed the dwarf noble origin. Great experience so far, much better prolouge chapter than the run-of-the-mill tutorial segments you'd usually find in these games.



The character models and animations aren't spectacular, but I find them to be plenty more appealing than anything from Bethesda whom are given so much praise for their graphics. Of course it doesn't look anything like Aion, it's not meant to have that anime bishounen boy art (though I'm sure people are going to mod that in at some point). The game isn't meant to be a showcase of eyecandy anyhow, and it doesn't matter much if you're playing in the isometric overhead view (which works great).