My Re-return to Dragon Age

Some games, you stop playing because they're bad. Some games you stop playing because you don't like them. There is a crucial difference. I'd describe the difference as Fallout being the former and Dragon Age being the latter.

As I've blogged previously, I'm prepared to admit that the plot/characters of Fallout 3 are good but the game is so overwhelmingly bad that it suffocates everything it comes into contact with. I go back to it occasionally in the vain hope that I missed something the first three times and I never make it more than a few hours in because the game pisses me off so much.

Dragon Age has a similar problem but it's much reduced. As far as I'm concerned, the only real problem with Dragon Age is the grinding. The levels are just too long and there is a hell of a lot of faffing about. Seriously, you see one dungeon, you've seen them all. I solved that problem this time around, though. I played it on easy and made my character immortal. You'd be amazed at the amount that cuts down the grind.

But why am I going back to Dragon Age anyway? Well, I'm bored. I'm bored, there's nothing else out and, let's face it, there is *something* about Dragon Age that keeps me coming back for more.

So, a week ago, I finally completed it. After it's original release about a year ago.

One of the things I've found about Dragon Age is... the characters I originally liked this time around ended up being the least interesting. I'll go through them:


Morrigan:
I found Morrigan the most interesting when I first played through Dragon Age. She's got a fun little side quest involving Flemmeth and she's... independent. Games (that aren't Overlord or Mirrors Edge) are written by men and so there are two usual types of females that pop up: Femme Fatales and simpering milksops. Morrigan is neither. She is strong and doesn't really care what anyone thinks.

The slight problem arises when we consider Morrigan's morality. She's not exactly dark side but she's definitely not a paragon either. When I first played I could never really guess what actions she would approve of. On the one hand that's kind of a good thing - Bioware created a character who isn't entirely predictable. On the other I kind of suspect that Bioware had two characters in mind when they created Morrigan and forgot to seperate them.

The thing that finally made me pissed off with Morrigan's character, though, is she doesn't change. The other characters you can influence for better or worse but Morrigan's story is tied into the games to the point where the other characters have ten endings, depending on your actions, she has a grand total of three, one of which is a very slight variation of ending #2.

Dragon Age is an RPG. It's all about the characters interaction with the PC. If you can't change or manipulate the characters, a crucial element has been lost and leaves the player (or me, at least) extremely unsatisfied.


Alastair:
Alastair is the quote unquote funny character. How funny he is depends on your point of view, naturally, but it's fair to say he's far from one of the great comedy characters. He has a few really good lines but they're mainly in the random banter between the NPCs whilst you're wandering around and almost all the characters get some good lines there.

Part of my problem with Alastair arose when I played Awakening, the expansion to Dragon Age. There, you meet Anders. A mage who you are introduced to shooting flames from his hands into the face of a darkspawn. He then shakes them with a look of shock on his face. He never says "hothothothot" but you can see he wants to. Anders is clearly the character they meant for Alastair but, for whatever reason, they never quite managed it.

I did end up quite liking Alastair this time around, though. Why? Because my female elf romanced him.

For all of Alastair's sarcasm and confidence, as soon as your lady starts flirting with him he turns into a 15 year old boy - it's revealed he's never had sex and it's doubtful if he's kissed anyone before. This is a pretty damn bold move to make, IMO. It's really rare that anyone is revealed to be a virgin unless there is a *very* specific (usually religious) reason for it. With Alastair, it adds a really nice dimension to his character and makes the choices you have to make at the end of the game that bit harder.



Leliana:
The Innocent Looking Woman With A Secret is one of those stock characters that pop up every once in a while. Leliana doesn't really subvert it that much. I did think they were going to do something interesting with having her being a completely insane religious fundamentalist but that never really materialised. Sadly.


Wynn:
Wynn at first appears to be an incredibly boring stock character. As you progress, though, and if you use her a lot you start getting a better feel for her character. Spoiler warning but she's dying and she's fine with it.

Having a character with death hanging over their head isn't exactly a new thing - Bioware did exactly the same thing with Fish Boy in Mass Effect 2 but it's done really well in Dragon Age. Part of the reason for this, I think, is that it doesn't turn up in conversation. There is no heartfelt confession that "this might be my last days on earth" or whatever. You get ambushed, fight off the attackers and prepare to leave. On the way, though Wynne just collapses.

It comes so completely out of no-where, I was really shocked. I was also pissed off. I liked Wynn. She was sweet, she had established herself as a mother figure/MILF to most of my team and she was touchingly concerned about my relationship with Leilana (I was shagging her at the time. I'm an NPC slut). I didn't want Wynne to die, I liked her. I then talked to her about it.

Now, a little backstory about me. I'll keep it brief I promise. I've been terrified of death since I've been very young - not exactly death but the idea of oblivion. My conciousness being extinguished. I'm terrified of it. Occasionally pacing round my room, punching walls, terrified. So yeah, it's fair to say that I occasionally get a bit freaked when death is openly discussed. This one conversation with Wynn really struck a chord with me, though.

My character was talking to Wynn, asking if there was anything that could be done. She said no. My character said that was awful. She said, why? My character said: Because everyone always wants more.

This one conversation has made me think that my attitude is childish. Very childish. Why am I terrified? I want more. I want more, I want more, I want more. Why? Shut up and leave me alone. I find it amazing that a piece of writing to cut through this attitude so simply and in such a low key way. This wasn't a grand dramatic conversation held at a key point in the game, it was just a chat between two friends.

That, I think, says a lot about the general quality of the writing in Dragon Age. Even the conversations they don't really expect people to get to on their first or second play throughs are brilliantly constructed and delivered. And she gives your doggy a bath. It's hilarious.



Ogrehn:
I pretty much ignored Ogrehn on my first two playthroughs. He was a berserk dwarf. Be still my beating heart, I've never come across a character that original.

Once I started talking to him a bit more, however, I found he was fucking hilarious. Admittedly, they save his funniest moment for Awakening but he gets plenty of great laughs in Origins. He tries, at various points, to pick a fight with you, thinking you were someone else, sleep with you, and yell at your dog - all whilst completely drunk. He's quite sweet as well, in that he has a very simple view of the world. He wants two things, beer and things to kill. So long as he has those, he's happy. In some hands, that would be a simplistic character. It's tiny touches that stop that being the case with Ogrehn. Part of this is his weird relationship with Brankha - his ex-wife. Part of it is how much he likes the PC. Either way, Bioware did well to take a stereotype and make him something much more fun and interesting.


Sten:
Sten is incredibly boring and I could never be bothered to talk to him.


Zevran:
Zevran wins the prize for Most Stupid Way Of Getting A Companion To Join Your Party. Long story short, he and a bunch of chaps try to ambush and kill you, he's not quite dead so you let him join you. Not a formula for a trusting relationship.

Zevran has his moments but most of the interesting stuff about him is centred around the group of Assassins he uesd to belong to - The Crows. I was fully expecting to hunt down and kill his employers at some point in the game and was pretty disappointed when I didn't. Other than that, he's not massively interesting.


So yes, as far as the characters go:

Good!
Ogrehn
Wynn
Alastair

Meh!
Leilana
Zevran

Bad!
Morrigan
Sten

Bonus character: Shale

Shale is awesome and wants to kill every pigeon in the world. I'm with him on that.