One of my many reasons that I have not been posting regularly on my blog is Dragon Age Inquisition. I am finally at the point where, four or five complete play-trough’s later, I can take a breath and talk about my experience with this game. Much of what I will say, I am sure, has already been said by gamers that are far superior than I. Regardless of that, here are my two-cents!
Character customization
Like the previous installments of Dragon Age, Inquisition allows you to really customize your character’s appearance. Like Origins, you have the choice of male or female human, elf, or dwarf; plus in Inquisition you have the option of playing a qunari – the long-horned villains of part two of DA II. As far as looks go the facial customization is insane. I likened it to making a later-version SIM. The hair options are the same for a male or female character, and they were (as always) quite limited on longer hairstyles. There is no body customization, though you can get some pretty impressive options out of the armor crafting. Each major piece of armor that you craft can be customized by material used, and each different material has a varying texture and color.
There is some minor customization of your character’s voice (two choices) which is a relief as, in my opinion, one of the female voice actors is really awkward. The only place that character creation kind of let me down was the pc’s backstory – you really have no choice in this. The backstory is based on your character’s race, and a couple of them were a little...meh to me. The elf, who is Dalish, was sent there by her keeper to spy on the (shem) gathering. It seemed unlikely to me, but throughout the course of the game the backstory was elaborated on (a little). I enjoyed the way Origins handled the backstory – allowing you to play through a bit of it and allowing you to choose a little more about your character’s background. For example, if you were an elf in Origins, you could choose to be a city-dwelling elf or to be a Dalish elf. In Inquisition, you are Dalish.
Overall however, I would say that the good parts of character creation blew me away so much that I really did not mind the more lacking parts. One of my favorite parts of games like this is always character creation, and Inquisition did not let me down!
The world
People like to compare the world size of this game to Skyrim, but they are quite different. In Skyrim you have this massive, mostly seamless open world. In Inquisition you have several massive (and some smaller) maps to explore in different regions in the world. While Skyrim focuses on one region of the world, Inquisition explores many very different regions. Skyrim takes place in a frozen tundra region; Inquisition is spread out over many different areas – deep forests, deserts, canyons, swamps, plains, and yes; there is a snowy map. Every map was stunning. Every map was stuffed with side-quests and off the beaten path things to do. There is only one map that really felt oppressively large and maybe a little boring between major stops on the map - The Hissing Wastes. The Wastes are desolate desert and it is understandable that there is a LOT of sand and nothingness. There are still many things to do on the map and it has a beauty of its own. The borders of the maps are not obvious. You will not run into an invisible net that you should be able to cross through when you reach the edge of the map. In most areas the edge of the map is simply uncrossable mountains or ridges. In the desert-type maps the edge of the world tends to be a sandstorm that your companions will refuse to enter. I can’t count the amount of times I stopped while playing this game and said “wow.” The scenery is magical; truly.
Storyline (minor spoilers)
The storyline is really great and has so much depth; it is also multi-faceted. On one hand, you have the rise of your pc; on the other you have this terrible antagonist that you don’t even know the identity of throughout the first portion of the game. Indeed, you are not even aware that there is an antagonist at the beginning of the game. Origins and DAII both had the capability of taking brutal, shocking twists in the personal life of the pc. There is plenty of room for these shocks in Inquisition as well. Much of the backstory of the world, the small details, build off of your exploits in Origins and DAII – I absolutely love this. I was never bored of the story, and I never found it predictable. I will say that I think players that are new to Dragon Age will miss out on much of the story if they have not played through the other Dragon Age games. As someone who is a fanatic of the first two, it is hard for me to say whether or not they would knowingly miss anything while playing Inquisition – any obvious “inside jokes” or confusing backstories. I cannot recommend playing through the first two before delving into this one enough.
Allies
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Varric is back with his sexy hairy chest!
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As always, Dragon Age is full of lively and interesting allies – including some familiar faces. Varric, everyone’s favorite little buddy from DAII is back to fight at your side. Cullen and Lilianna, from both of the previous games, are allies – though non-playable ones. Oh; and hey; Morrigan! You’ll get to see her again as well! One of the most amazing things to me is that you get to interact with your previous pc’s! You’ll see Hawk again, and depending on the fate of your pc from Origins, you may have some minor interaction with him or her. There are, of course, the famous Dragon Age romances. Inquisition romances did not let me down, overall. I would love more reaction from other allies about the relationship. Also: WFT Solas! To avoid spoilers I won’t elaborate, but seriously: wtf?!
Overall, all of the anticipation that I had; all of the excited glimpses at the “making of” and sneak peek videos – were all completely validated. This game is amazing. It is beyond what I imagined it would be. It is worth a half a dozen play-throughs. If you are an RPG fan you will not be disappointed.
TL;DR: it is bloody amazing and if you haven’t been introduced to this rpg world yet go and get Origins and DA II and educate yo’self.
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