Updated Impressions: Dragon Age: Origins

Dragon Age: Origins is totally surprising me with just how great it is. I mean, obviously I was expecting it to be good, being a Bioware game, but I didn’t expect it to be THIS good. My little brother hated Neverwinter Nights and played bits and pieces of Knights of the Old Republic. But he’s TOTALLY addicted to DAO. In fact, between Dragon Age and Demon’s Souls, my basketball nut brother has completely stopped playing NBA 2K10 (!), which hasn’t been opened by either of us in weeks. Lately in fact, I find myself having to play the “This is my PS3 so get the fuck off” card quite often just to get in some valuable playtime.

Yes, DAO starts off quite slow, but when it gets going, Jesus Christ does it ever get going. Sanayan lang talaga dun sa combat system, and it’s far more accessible than the previous D&D engine games, having been simplified for the console crowd (unlike the PC version, the default difficulty has friendly fire off, meaning less micromanagement of your party and more skull bashing fun).

But the absolute best thing about Dragon Age is how it improves on the Star Wars: KOTOR formula by making your party members feel even more like real personalities. They comment on decisions you make, and you can alienate them or make them care for you more depending on your actions. Another thing I really like is that the world that Bioware created is so rich. If you like reading up on backstory and things like that, this game is your fucking jam. There’s lengthy descriptions on everything: unique items, library books, character profiles etc, and it makes even some of the more mundane side quests (some of which have shades of Monster Hunter-like fetch tasks, RPG cliché #1 present and accounted for) are made better by the interesting things you learn about the vast world of Ferelden. There is also plenty of playtime here if you want it: to get the Platinum, you have to reach level 20 as each of the three classes, and there’s so much choice in the game that each playthrough can be a substantially different experience. For 2,100.00 , it doesn’t get much better than this, people, and if you like American style RPG’s, I can already recommend that you pick this baby up without delay. Some niggling FPS issues nonwithstanding, this could be my new favorite Bioware game. To all the role playing geeks out there: it's safe to bring that RPG nerd card out of hiding, (cue deep booming voice) for a new messiah has come to save us humble peasants, and its name is Dragon Age: Origins.

Morrigan fucking kicks ass!

(A small note on the special edition: although the content of the package in general is acceptable – I love the Blu-Ray video disc, and I’m sipping my hoji-cha from the pre-order mug right now - the DLC download method is so FUCKED UP. I was able to download it eventually, but not until I went through an embarrassingly long process involving multiple Bioware/EA accounts, multiple PS3 login names, and restarting the Dragon Age program 3 times in the span of 10 minutes to download each piece of DLC. I BLAME EA.)