Dragon Age: Inquisition is the best thing BioWare has made in years, a solid and expansive RPG with rousing characters and one of the gorgeous open worlds, and as a comeback story, Inquisition is pure gold. Despite the tough competition, Dragon Age: Inquisition came out on top of with Game of the Year honors at The Game Awards 2014, which drew 1.93 million viewers, a dramatic increase of 75 percent compared to viewership numbers for last year's Spike-produced VGX. BioWare definitely deserved it. With its diverse combat and game-changing narrative choices, Dragon Age: Inquisition was truly a gem worthy of the award.
Even here @ RPG Gamer, DA: I took second place as GOTY candidate, but the voting process is still on, and you can vote for your favorite RPG here, until Friday 19.
You'll lose yourself in Dragon Age fantastic rpg elements
Before starting, you should go to Dragon Age Keep (dragonagekeep.com) to customise the game world. You will need an Electronic Arts' Origin account to log in. Once you are happy with your game world, proceed to create your character. Each decision you make, even at this stage, will have consequences. The NPCs react differently when you are a human warrior or an elven mage.
You can go off and explore the massive landscape in front of you, assisting all of the downtrodden and abused locals in the area. You can carry on lengthy conversations with even the most minor characters, each line of dialogue revealing more and more fascinating tidbits about that person's life and the realm of Thedas. You play the game from the third-person perspective. You control a party of four, including your character.
You can go off and explore the massive landscape in front of you, assisting all of the downtrodden and abused locals in the area. You can carry on lengthy conversations with even the most minor characters, each line of dialogue revealing more and more fascinating tidbits about that person's life and the realm of Thedas. You play the game from the third-person perspective. You control a party of four, including your character.
When it comes to combat, you can opt for real-time hack-and-slash combat or bring up the tactical camera. Monsters to slay, armor to craft, items to collect, and books to read. The world feels endless - but more importantly, it's full of life. The Hinterlands, the first area you explore, is bigger than the first two games combined. It is so big that there are now mounts, such as horses and harts, for you to travel faster. Exploring one area could take at least two hours. Sure, other open-world games give you lots of quests to pursue and loot to horde, but Inquisition makes you feel like you're part of what's happening around you, not just some detached, prophesied savior making a beeline from one objective marker to the next.
You make tough decisions during the dialogues, which will affect how the story evolves and how others react to you. You can start a romance with an NPC by flirting or making decisions which align to his or her beliefs. Other NPCs can see you like someone and even intervene. When you pass people on the street, they praise (or condemn) you for your actions and decisions. Every time you talk to one of your companions, your comments really mean something - and actually affect your ally's impression of you.
Then there are tales that tell of the commitment Antivan assassins have to their order in the face of torture and death, and how they're complete badasses. Hundreds of these stories will pop up during a playthrough - all of them telling you just a little bit about the history, politics, and peoples outside the bounds of the main quest, giving you the sense that you’re just a relatively small part of a large, diverse world. Just the main storyline quests will probably take you at least 40 hours to complete. If you like to explore every corner in Thedas or loot everything you find (and you will want to do so), be prepared to spend 100 hours or more.
And then again, to put everything awesome about DA:I would take at least five articles, and who would read that? If you haven't already, get the Dragon Age: Inquisition and see it for yourself, and in the meantime, enjoy these screens and gameplay video, and be sure to comment your experience with the Dragon Age, here in the comments, or our Forum.
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