By Nate Ralph
REDWOOD CITY, California — With its giant battle axes, labyrinthine dialogue trees and magical quests, the upcoming Dragon Age: Origins is a blast from ye olde past.
Were it not for the game's vastly improved visuals, you might think you had stepped back into the golden age of the late '90s, when PC gamers could put on their robes and wizard hats and fake a familiarity with the arcane Dungeons & Dragons rule set.
But much has changed in the last decade. During a recent visit to the Redwood Shores studio of the game's publisher, Electronic Arts, I played Dragon Age and once again stepped into a world swirling with magic and swordplay.
Developed by BioWare, the company known for epic, story-driven role-playing games like Baldur's Gate and Mass Effect, Dragon Age is shaping up to be a decidedly next-gen approach to the classic fantasy genre.
(Dragon Age will be released for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC in the second half of 2009. I played the PC version.)
Were it not for the game's vastly improved visuals, you might think you had stepped back into the golden age of the late '90s, when PC gamers could put on their robes and wizard hats and fake a familiarity with the arcane Dungeons & Dragons rule set.
But much has changed in the last decade. During a recent visit to the Redwood Shores studio of the game's publisher, Electronic Arts, I played Dragon Age and once again stepped into a world swirling with magic and swordplay.
Developed by BioWare, the company known for epic, story-driven role-playing games like Baldur's Gate and Mass Effect, Dragon Age is shaping up to be a decidedly next-gen approach to the classic fantasy genre.
(Dragon Age will be released for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC in the second half of 2009. I played the PC version.)
The mere whisper of the name Baldur's Gate is likely to get more than a few role-playing fans waxing poetic. BioWare's classic RPG stole hundreds of hours of our lives, steeping players in a world rich with lore and complex combat mechanics. That we're still talking about it so many years later is a testament to the power it held over a generation. BioWare hopes to resurrect those fond memories, dubbing Dragon Age: Origins the "spiritual successor" to Baldur.
Dragon Age: Origins puts players in the boots of one of the last Grey Wardens, an ancient order of warriors sworn to protect the world from the Blight — evil monsters that once lived underground, but have risen to surface to wage war. My experience began in the encampment of the Dalish, elves who were enslaved by humans for thousands of years, but are now living life as second-class citizens. I was there to recruit fighters for an army to take on the Blight, but getting help was going to require doing a few favors.
Dragon Age is a story-driven game, which means lots of introductions to other characters, history lessons that kick-start quests and sifting through dialogue trees to chat with the populace. If you're the type of gamer who abhors anything coming between you and bludgeoning something to death, Dragon Age will be a difficult title to get through.
And don't think you can just skip through the dialogue, because it's crucial to understanding the decisions that you're asked to make during the adventure.
"There are times when you just sort of push back from the keyboard and go, 'What am I going to do here?'" says the game's executive producer, Dan Tudge. Dragon Age, he says, is a game for mature audiences — not because of blood and gore, but because of "the weight and reality of the choices you'd expect to experience in heavy situations."
In the quest I became entangled in, the Dalish leader needed the heart of the local werewolf chieftain to prevent wounded elves from becoming werewolves themselves. Sounds simple enough. But when I fought my way into the heart of the werewolves' lair, they asked me to sit down and discuss things. Without spoiling the plot, the werewolves told me that the elves weren't exactly the hapless victims they appeared to be. What call will you make?
Your in-game party can consist of a maximum of four characters. A "party approval meter" will determine how partners react to you, and is based on the actions you take during your adventure. If you kill too many innocent people, your morally correct sidekicks might ditch you. But if you play your cards right or ply characters with gifts, they might offer you a lucrative side quest, or even become a romantic interest.
Battles take place in real time, with the computer taking control of whatever players in your party you're not controlling directly. A Tactics menu allows you to program characters in your party to take specific actions when certain conditions are met. For example, if Warrior B ever falls below 50 percent health, Mage A could automatically drop whatever he or she is doing and start casting healing spells. The higher your character's level, the more Tactics you'll be able to assign.
While BioWare has abandoned the traditional Dungeons & Dragons rule set in favor of its own system, it has kept the Pause function that defined the combat in the developer's earlier games — simply tap the space bar and you'll be able to stop the action, allowing you to assign commands to your characters and observe how the battle is going.
Modern, next-gen influences include quick recovery of health and mana as opposed to having to rest at inns. There's also a cool-down period after you cast spells — players familiar with World of Warcraft's combat mechanics will find the skills they've picked up managing toolbars coming in quite handy.
BioWare plans to let players craft their own adventures. The Dragon Age Toolset will allow users to modify the game by crafting new worlds and changing the characters' and enemies' AI, then share their designs with the community.
But Dragon Age won't offer a multiplayer mode, which might offend players who shared their Baldur's Gate experience with friends. Tudge explained that while BioWare is currently fully devoted to the single-player experience, there is a good chance we'll see multiplayer components in the Dragon Age universe somewhere down the road.
With a role-playing game of this scale, it's difficult to form any concrete impressions from a brief demo, but from what we can observe right now, Dragon Age: Origins is shaping up to be an epic experience.
Images courtesy BioWare
Dragon Age: Origins puts players in the boots of one of the last Grey Wardens, an ancient order of warriors sworn to protect the world from the Blight — evil monsters that once lived underground, but have risen to surface to wage war. My experience began in the encampment of the Dalish, elves who were enslaved by humans for thousands of years, but are now living life as second-class citizens. I was there to recruit fighters for an army to take on the Blight, but getting help was going to require doing a few favors.
Dragon Age is a story-driven game, which means lots of introductions to other characters, history lessons that kick-start quests and sifting through dialogue trees to chat with the populace. If you're the type of gamer who abhors anything coming between you and bludgeoning something to death, Dragon Age will be a difficult title to get through.
And don't think you can just skip through the dialogue, because it's crucial to understanding the decisions that you're asked to make during the adventure.
"There are times when you just sort of push back from the keyboard and go, 'What am I going to do here?'" says the game's executive producer, Dan Tudge. Dragon Age, he says, is a game for mature audiences — not because of blood and gore, but because of "the weight and reality of the choices you'd expect to experience in heavy situations."
In the quest I became entangled in, the Dalish leader needed the heart of the local werewolf chieftain to prevent wounded elves from becoming werewolves themselves. Sounds simple enough. But when I fought my way into the heart of the werewolves' lair, they asked me to sit down and discuss things. Without spoiling the plot, the werewolves told me that the elves weren't exactly the hapless victims they appeared to be. What call will you make?
Your in-game party can consist of a maximum of four characters. A "party approval meter" will determine how partners react to you, and is based on the actions you take during your adventure. If you kill too many innocent people, your morally correct sidekicks might ditch you. But if you play your cards right or ply characters with gifts, they might offer you a lucrative side quest, or even become a romantic interest.
Battles take place in real time, with the computer taking control of whatever players in your party you're not controlling directly. A Tactics menu allows you to program characters in your party to take specific actions when certain conditions are met. For example, if Warrior B ever falls below 50 percent health, Mage A could automatically drop whatever he or she is doing and start casting healing spells. The higher your character's level, the more Tactics you'll be able to assign.
While BioWare has abandoned the traditional Dungeons & Dragons rule set in favor of its own system, it has kept the Pause function that defined the combat in the developer's earlier games — simply tap the space bar and you'll be able to stop the action, allowing you to assign commands to your characters and observe how the battle is going.
Modern, next-gen influences include quick recovery of health and mana as opposed to having to rest at inns. There's also a cool-down period after you cast spells — players familiar with World of Warcraft's combat mechanics will find the skills they've picked up managing toolbars coming in quite handy.
BioWare plans to let players craft their own adventures. The Dragon Age Toolset will allow users to modify the game by crafting new worlds and changing the characters' and enemies' AI, then share their designs with the community.
But Dragon Age won't offer a multiplayer mode, which might offend players who shared their Baldur's Gate experience with friends. Tudge explained that while BioWare is currently fully devoted to the single-player experience, there is a good chance we'll see multiplayer components in the Dragon Age universe somewhere down the road.
With a role-playing game of this scale, it's difficult to form any concrete impressions from a brief demo, but from what we can observe right now, Dragon Age: Origins is shaping up to be an epic experience.
Images courtesy BioWare
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