Pumpkin's Video Game Diary!

[Pumpkin]

Dragon Age: Origins (PlayStation 3)

Note: There is some sexual content if that is something that bothers you. It is overall pretty mild, however.

Story:

Dragon Age: Origins starts with an origin story of your choosing for your customizable hero. The country of Ferelden is entering a period called "The Blight" in which demons from underground rise up and start killing people. These demons are led by a dragon called the Archdemon. A group of special soldiers called the Grey Wardens are tasked with defeating this Archdemon and ending the blight. As you can expect, you end up becoming one of these Grey Wardens and need to recruit the help of soldiers from around the country from different backgrounds by making them aware of the treaty that they must help during a blight and helping them have the means to do so.

How you go about helping the different peoples is largely up to you. You will also recruit allies during your mission with their own stories to explore. The game gives you a lot of options as far as dialogue choices and solutions to dilemmas that pop up. Your origin story will also affect the beginning of the game as well as how you're treated and viewed throughout the story.

Gameplay:
In this game you will take control of your chosen hero and be accompanied by up to three allies at a time. While you can only control one character at a time directly, each character gets a certain amount of Tactics slots in which you can assign them what to do in battle. You can also switch who you control with the L1 and R1 buttons at pretty much any time. At level up you will be given points to assign to stats to improve them how you see fit, as well as points to unlock skills to use in battle. You can use skills as well as some other features like healing items by bringing up the Radial Menu by pressing L2. You can also set skills to use with the Triangle, O, and Square Buttons. To attack you simply need to press X on your chosen target.

A large part of the game is dialogue choices and sidequests. Sidequests range from simple and short to long and complex and you're free to pursue this at your leisure. You can find a section on the menu which will keep you up to date on your quests and such. You can also view codex entries from this menu to get more immersed in the lore and history of the world if you so choose. Dialogue choices appear quite often and sometimes have negligible effects while other times will affect the game in a substantial way. It will also affect how your chosen companions come to view you if they're with you when you make these choices. You can also craft items, buy and sell equipment, give materials to your forces, give gifts to companions, and rest at camp to be rejuvenated and get to know your allies a bit more.

World:
The game takes place in Ferelden and has many areas to explore within the country, and more will open up depending on where you are in the story. Once you exit a map, you will usually be taken to the World Map, where you select a destination and your party will travel there. Occasionally you will be stopped en route for a fight or an event. Some larger towns will have a town map where you choose which section of the town to visit. Dungeons often have several maps as well to explore. There is a decent variety and a lot of locations to explore with a lot to do within them.

Characters:
I won't mention every character here because many are not missable and I am not sure if I recruited them all. You'll gain more playable characters to use as the story progresses and depending on your choices. They have different personalities and stories and generally have their own sidequest as well. You can also romance some of them depending on whether you made a male or female character. You can speak with them when they're in your party or back at camp and you can also give them gifts to increase affection. Each also has a special gift you can find. A character may leave if they dislike you enough, I believe. You can select three of your allies to accompany you in to battle. They also will engage in conversations with each other as you explore.

Overall:
I enjoyed Dragon Age: Origins. I like that there are different origin stories and many different options and paths to take, which makes me excited to play again and see how differently things can go. I liked a lot of the characters and I loved how they would take to each other and seeing them bond. I particularly was a fan of Leliana, Dog, and Wynne. There was certainly a lot to do and I felt very involved with all of the decisions I had to make. There were some negatives though. The game was a bit confusing in some ways and it didn't do a good job of teaching me the ins and outs of how to play, which led to a lot of confusion. While some story sections were amazing, others were dull in my opinion and didn't get me excited to continue. The actual fights could also be kind of boring since I mostly just had to press X and kind of sit there and wait unless I wanted to be fancy and use a skill once in a while even if I didn't need it, just to break up the monotony. Overall though it was a fun game, it was very immersive, and I do plan to play it again. I look forward to playing Dragon Age II at some point.

Verdict:
LIKED IT