Recall and talk about the game Dragon Age Origins (video/text) created by the media group Playatlevel

This video, exactly, like a review, contains spoilers! If you have not passed the game, then we strongly recommend that you do it immediately! And if you still have passed it or you are calm about spoilers, then a pleasant viewing!

(There was a Flash player, but since 2020, Flash has not been supported by browsers)

You know, we are big fan of the genre RPG. Throughout the time, how much we play video games, we replayed a huge number of role -playing games and action, as it is now fashionable, with RPG elements. We played classics like Baldur's Gate, Planescape Torment And Neverwinter Nights, We played in, so to speak, "New Wave" RPG, that is Jade Empire: Special Edition, The Elder Scrolls 3 and 4 parts, Mass Effect and similar games. We even played Russian RPG, It seems it is difficult to be God and others whose names we do not remember, and for some reason we don’t even want to remember them. What are we all leading to? Yes, to the fact that the genre RPG is the closest to us. For us, the standard of role -playing play has always been and remains, not Baldur's Gate, How many might think, and Neverwinter Nights. In this game, everything was done on an almost ideal level, in our opinion, level. A frankly not complicated and not confusing story unfolding in the most probably worked out setting Forgotten Realms, It was just perfectly served and crashed into memory so much that even after 7 years, we can tell you what was there, in Neverwinter, it happened. And again, what we are all leading to? To the fact that since the time of Neverwinter Nights, well, or a very crooked Neverwinter Nights 2, not one came out, and we emphasize this, not a single RPG, which could boast of such elaboration of the world and its history. But now, a little more than a year ago, namely, on November 3, 2009, a wonderful game was released, in our opinion, the best game of 2009 and the best classic RPG of the last five -year plan, dear spectators, we say, of course, about Dragon Age: Beginning.
Excuse us, dear spectators/readers, if we tired someone with our little story, then we will try to be more constructive.

Doli elves. Most similar to the embodiment of elves in books.

So, let's start our conversation, we, perhaps, from the very beginning. The player begins his way with the character creation menu. Here we choose the floor, one of the three of the provided races, person, gnome or elf;one of the three classes, a warrior, a robber or a magician;and finally, one of the background, a noble person, the Daliysky, t.e. wild elf, urban elf, noble gnome, gnome-prostlyodin or magician. Background, this is a topic for a separate discussion and we do not want to mix it with the main plot, so we will talk about them a little later. After choosing all of the above, we set up the appearance of our character. And at this point, to our deep regret, the developers made Fale. I don’t know, perhaps this is only our problem, but, in our opinion, in the inside of the game editor you cannot make a truly unique and satisfying all your aesthetic needs. No, of course, we were provided with a wide selection of various facial tattoos, settings of curves and not very noses, various vegetation, both on the face and on the head, the adjustment of the voice that will sound from the lips of our hero only during hot battles or hacking locks.

The character generation window.

Then the adjustment of the portrait, in our opinion, is the best part of the entire general. There is where to turn around. You can choose the background of the portrait, the position of the face, the distance to the camera, even the expression on the face, and in the computer version of these settings there are much more options than in the same Xbox’o versions.

Excerpt of the background for the Dali elves.

Then we go through one of the six backgrounds and in each of them we meet the representative of the Order of the Gray Guardians of Duncan, who is gaining recruits, as Mor is approaching - an invasion of the generations of darkness. Together with Duncan, we go to the ancient fortress of Ostagar, where we have to go through the rite of dedication to gray guards and help King Ferlden Kaylan to fight with the upcoming creatures of darkness. For the rite of initiation, the blood of the generation of darkness is needed, and together with other recruits and gray guard, Alister goes to get it into the wild lands of Corcaries, where at the same time, with the help of the sorceress Morrigan and her mother - the legendary witch of the wild lands Flemt - we find ancient treaties of gray guards. When dedicated to each recruit, they give a drink of the blood of creatures, and only our character is destined to survive.

Gray Guardians. For some, he is really murderous.

Then the battle begins. At first, everything goes according to the king’s plan, but at the crucial moment when the king and Duncan are surrounded, one of the commanders, Logain, withdraws his troops and throws the king to the mercy of fate. The king’s army suffers defeat, the king himself and Duncan are dying, and we, together with the alister, are saving Flemn, which is convinced that only we are able to stop the pestilence and save Ferlden. Alistair offers to take advantage of the contracts and collect the army from the Dali elves, the magician magicians and the Orzamar gnomes. So our story begins. In truth, an epic beginning is quite an epic and this is only a general description of events, this is already about the 4th hourly beginning is saturated with small events and side quests, and what happens in the game further is simply indescribable. You need to play, friends. By the way, it should be noted that in addition to the “physical world”, in which a majority of the game process passes, there is also a world of spirits, here it is called a shadow. Several large quests are connected with this world and, when playing for a magician, several side. The world of shadows is not like reality, it is somewhat surreal and, according to game mythology, a shadow is a place where the creatures of darkness came from.

Panoramic type of shadow. Ehhh ... what beauty is what!

And now, as we promised earlier, background. There are only six backgrounds in the game, the player can choose any, but there are certain reservations. So, for example, playing for a person, we can choose one of the two backgrounds-a noble person or a magician, for a character-elf, a little larger choice is a dolle elf, urban elf or magician, and gnomes, which are not susceptible to magic, are available only by commoner or noble dwarf. Backstory affects mainly on the appearance of some side quests in key cities and the attitude of some characters towards you. Also, depending on the chosen background, some dialogs are changing, but these changes rarely follow in something significant. It is noteworthy that the first step towards the creation of the background was taken in the first Mass Effect. True, then the choice of background was affected only by one unique sid-quest and on several changing dialogue lines. IN Dragon Age Bioware stepped further, and now the background is a kind of prologue to the further history of our character. And at the same time, this prologue is no less interesting than any other quest in the game and is its important part.

An example of the Xbox 360 version of the game.

Now, perhaps, from the plot we move on to gameplay. By gameplay Dragon Age very similar to its ancestor Neverwinter Nights, That is, we travel by locations, fighting enemies, perform quests, conduct dialogs and solve problems of local scale. The combat system is generally traditional, for RPG. We have a whole arsenal of magical and non -magical abilities and skills, both passive and active, which we use in battles with enemies. Each skill has been worked out perfectly, both from a graphic and practical point of view. In battles with enemies, it will not be possible to just cut everyone right and left with a light sword, as it was in Kotor, Now for each group of enemies you need to select a certain tactic. And thanks to the special window “Tactics”, you can reconfigure the AI ​​of the whole batch at its discretion. Now it will not be possible to complain about the stupidity of the AI ​​of computer partners, now everything is in your hands.

One of the most common dialogue plans in the game.

The dialogue system is not very different from the same Kotor or Neverwinter Nights. We are given a cloud, interesting and very well written text, and from 4 to 8 answer options, each of which can lead a dialogue on a little different ways. It would seem, BioWare use old techniques - we can intimidate the opponent or, vice versa, convince him, pull out the necessary or simply interesting information, which can then be read in the journal, and everything is in this spirit. But in Dragon Age: all this starts fresh, and in this regard to Dragon Age: Beginning The saying "everything new is well forgotten old" is applicable ". And indeed, the era of textual RPG It began back in the late 90s, ended prematurely in the mid-2000s and received a new life precisely in Dragon Age: Beginning.

Production of darkness. Detailing in the game is really at a high level.

Visually, the game is made at a fairly high level. Each dialogue plan is very good, not as good as in Mass Effect, But still it’s nice to look at the characters, and besides, in some situations they behave like living people. Locations are painted very beautifully, they are slightly smaller than in the same Mass Effect or Kotor, but objects of interaction on them are many times more. Almost every angle you can stumble upon some KAT-scenes, for which various options for the development of events were written. Such attention to, even small events that some do not even meet, is pleasantly surprising.

Excessive bloodiness is another distinguishing feature of Dragon Age Origins.

In conclusion, I want to say only one. Dragon Age: Beginning Really the best classic RPG Over the past 5 years. It pleases almost everyone - not intricate, but still an interesting plot, the excellent elaboration of the world, perfectly written dialogues and characters, in general, almost everyone. And looking at all this, you will freely close your eyes to some small errors or slightly crooked graphics. Good connoisseurs RPG, And, as we think, everyone who calls themselves gamers will have a game. Our assessment of it is 9.5 of 10 possible. Our advice to all you, go through the game to the end, do not spare time, it will be a good help to the soon Dragon Age II.

That's all, we returned to the not -distant past and remembered about the wonderful RPG. We hope you were pleased to remember the clocks that you spent in the game.P.S: We set our materials on Stogpeim for the first time, so write objective reviews. As a bonus, we want to remind you that this year there will be not few great and just excellent RPGs, we remembered one of them and duplicated the trailer of one of these RPGs at leisure. And which one, you yourself will find out)

(There was a Flash player, but since 2020, Flash has not been supported by browsers)