The first Gameplay trailer was released today as well as the release date (Now delayed to November 21st) so I figured I'd make the thread so people can post their thoughts on the third installment of Bioware's Dragon Age series of games!
Summary:
The epic role-playing series from BioWare takes a thrilling leap forward with the power of Frostbite 3. Beautiful vistas and incredible new possibilities await you. Ready yourself for Dragon Age: Inquisition.
A cataclysmic event plunges the land of Thedas into turmoil. Dragons darken the sky, casting a shadow of terror over a once-peaceful kingdom. Mages break into all-out war against the oppressive Templars. Nations rise against one another. It falls to you and your allies to restore order as you lead the Inquisition and hunt down the agents of chaos.
BioWare’s latest action-adventure delivers an unparalleled story set in a vast, changeable landscape. Explore hidden caves, defeat truly monumental creatures, and shape the world around you based on your unique play style.
Explore, lead, and battle: Tough choices define your experience, and even one decision can change the course of what's to come.
As part of creating your Inquisitor, you will be able to choose between three distinct classes [warrior, rogue, mage]. Each comes with a unique set of abilities, weaponry, special moves, and even class-reactive story content. Further, as your Inquisitor grows in power, you will be able to select a specialization. These advanced classes introduce entirely new abilities to your combat repertoire.
Note: Dwarfs cannot be mages.
Released specializations as of now:
Warrior: Champion
Champions are defenders and protectors, and when a warrior trains in the champion’s tradition, he or she becomes unstoppable. Champions use their armor, weapon and awareness to shrug off incoming attacks while holding critical positions on the battlefield and protecting allies in the process.
Mage: Knight Enchanter
Among the Circles of Magi, only a few mages have the strength of will necessary to focus their energy inward. Wrapped in protective magics and wielding blades of arcane force, the Knight Enchanters are rare, but inspiring sights as they lead the charge into enemy ranks.
Rogue: Artificer
Intricate mechanisms are the core of the artificer’s craft: Deadly traps; Distracting contraptions; Marvels of engineering turned to deadly purpose. If an artificer is standing at the far end of a seemingly innocuous stretch of the battlefield, you should find another path. If he or she is smiling? Best just to hope your affairs are in order.
Following the opening of the game, the Veil has torn across Thedas, and the Inquisitor is the sole survivor of one of those tearings. As the Demon Invasion begins, a decision is made to restore the Inquisition, and the Inquisitor is tasked with leading it to investigate the tears.
Referred to as Madame de Fer, “the Lady of Iron”, Vivienne lives up to her title. A leader among the mages and official enchanter to the Imperial court, she is renowned as a fearsome woman who achieved her position through guile and deft political maneuvering. Vivienne allows nothing to stand in the way of what she desires—not those who claim she is a social climber, not those who seek to restrict her power, not even her fellow mages who would conscript her into a rebellion with which she disagrees. Vivienne fights to restore order in a world gone mad…so long as that leaves her among those left standing, once all is said and done.
Cassandra Pentaghast:
Though of noble birth, Cassandra Pentaghast turned her back on a life of wealth and privilege to join the Seekers of Truth. The ancient order serves as a watchful eye over corruption and magical threats, granted ultimate authority in its investigations by the Chantry—or it did, prior to abandoning their duty in response to the mage rebellion. Cassandra did not join her brothers in this, instead remaining loyal to Divine Justinia and her efforts to restore order in the face of chaos. She is both pious and driven, the sword in the right hand of the Divine, seeking justice above all else.
Morrigan:
Whether the dark-haired sorceress seeks to influence the Imperial throne, or harbors more sinister motives, no-one knows for certain. This Witch of the Wilds arrived in Orlais rather suddenly three years ago as the newly-appointed “arcane advisor” to Empress Celene. In this role, Morrigan presents a source of information unfiltered by religious dogma, and satisfies Celene’s life-long curiosity about magic. However, whispers carry concern of Morrigan having Celene wrapped around her finger, teaching the Empress forbidden, dark arts in secret.
Varric Tethras:
Varric Tethras is one part adventurous rogue, one part dashing storyteller, and three parts trouble. Born on the surface, Varric has little love for his warrior brethren—all his contacts lie with the dwarves of the Merchants Guild, though he has little taste for their schemes. Still, he has found a place as an outsider, rubbing shoulders with both the wealthy elite as well as the worst of scoundrels. To hear him tell of it, that’s all he truly cares about, though anyone who truly knows him claims differently. They say that, try as he might, Varric has been drawn more and more into conflicts that shake the world—ones that he can’t get himself out of with a quick tale.
I'll be adding more stuff to this as more information is released. Feel free to post your thoughts on the game as it stands in development, discuss the gameplay trailer from today, or talk about what race/class/spec combos you are going to try on November 21st! Please don't go too off topic talking about this games predecessors. Although it may be necessary to reference the previous games, I am hoping this Dragon Age III thread doesn't become an argument about Dragon Age II. Have fun guys!
I am excited about the story and the new engine, but I've also heard a lot of sketchy things that they're trying to make the game more "social" and "mobile" from people who went to pax and those are big red warning signs to me. I really fucking hope it's good cause I'm a huge sucker for RPGs, but at the same time I won't cry too much if it blows cause I have DS 2 for PC in 3 days and Witcher 3 to satiate that need.
On April 23 2014 04:27 LaNague wrote: well, no classes and just warrior/rogue/mage talent trees or whatever allready tell me that this is far away from the RPGs bioware used to stand for.
Its really sad, they either just cant do it anymore or they dont care and just want dem quick monies.
How many classes were there in KotOR?
I don't buy games at release any longer, so how good it is doesn't really affect me.
On April 23 2014 04:27 LaNague wrote: well, no classes and just warrior/rogue/mage talent trees or whatever allready tell me that this is far away from the RPGs bioware used to stand for.
Its really sad, they either just cant do it anymore or they dont care and just want dem quick monies.
How many classes were there in KotOR?
I don't buy games at release any longer, so how good it is doesn't really affect me.
6 or somehing, it also used the NWN combat engine, which means it basically used DnD rules.
DAO was decent and DA2 was horrible, we'll see how DA3 goes. I'm certainly not holding my breath and will wait for reviews/opinions. More excited by some Kickstarter RPG projects that this.
There are some 30 minute convention floor game play demo videos floating around youtube you can check out as well.
It certainly looks like the environments are an improvement over the limited scenery they had in DA2. The combat looks very similar to DA2's style, with more gritty, visceral melee animations rather than the stylized comic book style melee of DA2.
It also seemed like they were trying to really push the difference between playing the pause-and-plan play style vs the real-time play style. In the standard real time mode you can switch to an up close 'over the shoulder' point of view and lock on to specific enemies. In the pause mode you have more camera freedom, additional control options for your spells and traps, and you can have the actions play out in slow motion until the commands you have queued up finish.
From what I can tell of the story I'm not expecting it to be amazing like DA:O was, but even if their writing has been in decline since ME:2, bioware still does a better job than most AAA game devs.
On April 23 2014 07:02 Torte de Lini wrote: So I've never played a single Dragon Age; do I need to play them all to play this? Has the game aged well?
All three are linked, but I don't think it is necessary to play the other two to play this if you like RPGs! I would recommend Origins (the first one) as it was pretty damn good overall. I honestly didn't much like DA2 simply because it lessened the scope of the world (only gave you one playable race, fewer locations that the first game, etc.). Anyways I think DAO has aged fairly well and would recommend it!
If you like RPGs, and you like medieval fantasy, then you should absolutely play Dragon Age: Origins. Its strengths are its story, its characters, the depth of lore built for this fictional world, and that it just has the perfect feeling for the kind of story they wanted to tell. The game is buggy as hell and ridiculously difficult if you don't cheese the enemy AI in some parts, but every shortfall the game has from a technical stand point is made up for in stride by its strengths.
If you don't care about playing a story/character driven game, then I don't think this franchise is for you.
EDIT: Its hard for me to explain how good DA:O is without spoiling many of the things that made it so great. Basically, if you DO care about playing story and character driven games, it is just an absolute must-play.
DA:2 is mediocre, has some good moments, the combat is a bit more fast paced, well tuned, and fun in my opinion (but many people disagree), the characters are pretty good (aside from the fact that literally every one of your party members will offer to have sex with you every time you talk to them no matter your gender, race, personality, or even if you repeatedly tell them you aren't interested), and it tells a very different kind of story (it just follows the life of your character, your family, and your party members over the course of 10 years), but its story is very lack luster outside of your investment in the characters and it basically spends the whole game in one environment with only the key missions ever taking you outside the same dreary city that the game takes place in.
On April 23 2014 07:02 Torte de Lini wrote: So I've never played a single Dragon Age; do I need to play them all to play this? Has the game aged well?
You can play DAO it's a good RPG, it has the good old real time with pause combat and an okayish story (pretty generic sadly). But that's only if you don't have played better older CRPGs like Baldur's gate (best mix of gameplay/story), Icewind Dale (more action focused) and Torment (more story focused, gameplay is kinda meh).
To be fair to Dragon Age 2, you can literally see when they were forced to rush that thing out the door by their publisher. Lackluster endings, limited options on how your decisions affected the ending. I think with more time, that game could be really good.
I'm excited for Dragon Age 3. I haven't given up on Bioware yet.
On April 23 2014 04:27 LaNague wrote: well, no classes and just warrior/rogue/mage talent trees or whatever allready tell me that this is far away from the RPGs bioware used to stand for.
Its really sad, they either just cant do it anymore or they dont care and just want dem quick monies.
How many classes were there in KotOR?
I don't buy games at release any longer, so how good it is doesn't really affect me.
6 or somehing, it also used the NWN combat engine, which means it basically used DnD rules.
Guess I have to be more clearer. There were 3 classes in KotOR. Then three Jedi sub classes you could get after a few levels. Basically the same as in this game from what we know thus far. The same idea they had in DA:O.
DnD isn't all that suited for PC games. It works, but I wouldn't say it gives the optimal experience. Too many things are missing from the skill sets (flying, vertical traps), forcing them to rebalance things. It is probably easier to get it right than trying to design things from scratch though.
Anyways, dragon age 1 is a game that almost anyyone would enjoy, especially if they can play the older style "pause and plan stuff" RPGs. It also has Morrigan.
Yeah it depends on what type of RPG you like. DA is very linear and narrative based, and not really my thing. It was generally well liked though so chances are you may like it. I had got it on the cheap... like 7 bucks, but just couldn't get into it really. If they ever decide to make a spiritual successor to NWN though, I'd be all over it.
On April 23 2014 09:04 LaNague wrote: DnD worked quite well for BG, WNW, icewind dale.
It really didn't. Those games were amazing because they were the first of their kind. Having played actual D&D and knowing the system, twinking made the games very easy, even IWD. Meanwhile people who didn't know D&D were up shit creek as the game let them make mage/thieves and bards that suck at everything, for example. NWN's system was basically a gutted 3rd edition which pissed off D&D players to no end, while making it no clearer for the newbie.
The most faithful adaptation of 3rd ed D&D was in Temple of Elemental Evil, (Knights of the Chalice also deserves a mention) and it had a difficulty level to go with it, making it the D&D twinker's wet dream, but also making it almost completely inaccessible to newbies.
long story short, if you insist on using a D&D adaptation, you will either make your game too easy for D&D players, or too hard for other people. Seeing as practically nobody even plays tabletop D&D anymore, I think the D&D adaptation is stone dead in video games, and for good reason.
On April 23 2014 06:59 imJealous wrote: There are some 30 minute convention floor game play demo videos floating around youtube you can check out as well.
It certainly looks like the environments are an improvement over the limited scenery they had in DA2. The combat looks very similar to DA2's style, with more gritty, visceral melee animations rather than the stylized comic book style melee of DA2.
It also seemed like they were trying to really push the difference between playing the pause-and-plan play style vs the real-time play style. In the standard real time mode you can switch to an up close 'over the shoulder' point of view and lock on to specific enemies. In the pause mode you have more camera freedom, additional control options for your spells and traps, and you can have the actions play out in slow motion until the commands you have queued up finish.
From what I can tell of the story I'm not expecting it to be amazing like DA:O was, but even if their writing has been in decline since ME:2, bioware still does a better job than most AAA game devs.
So I saw that convention gameplay and I don't know man. I don't understand why they absolutely want to revamp gameplay each episodes and try this arcady style probably resulting in a 20H game...
And then I'm starting to see radial menus (for consoles that may be just ported as is) and I'm like "Huuu not sure.....".
And come on bioware, remove sex scenes they're stupid. Or have the balls to do it for real.
On April 23 2014 09:23 beef42 wrote: It really didn't. Those games were amazing because they were the first of their kind. Having played actual D&D and knowing the system, twinking made the games very easy, even IWD. Meanwhile people who didn't know D&D were up shit creek as the game let them make mage/thieves and bards that suck at everything, for example. NWN's system was basically a gutted 3rd edition which pissed off D&D players to no end, while making it no clearer for the newbie.
The most faithful adaptation of 3rd ed D&D was in Temple of Elemental Evil, (Knights of the Chalice also deserves a mention) and it had a difficulty level to go with it, making it the D&D twinker's wet dream, but also making it almost completely inaccessible to newbies.
long story short, if you insist on using a D&D adaptation, you will either make your game too easy for D&D players, or too hard for other people. Seeing as practically nobody even plays tabletop D&D anymore, I think the D&D adaptation is stone dead in video games, and for good reason.
Well NWN really shined with modding. I spent a lot of time on a server called World of Greyhawk, which recreated a lot of the old school AD&D stuff pretty well. Practically everything was modable, skills and spells, HCR rules and all. So I think NWN did an awesome job in recreating tabletop D&D, but mostly because of the community. I still plan to go back and play once in a while on some of those servers that are still around.
But yeah, pretty doubtful that we'd ever see another gem like NWN again. Can't see any dev opening up their game to the community like that, too much money at stake. Especially when people are willing to pay monthly for a game with a fraction of the depth that NWN had.