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Preview Dragon Age Origin Stories Revealed!

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Tags: BioWare; Dragon Age

In lieu of using Bioware's broken site for information, you could swing on down to <a href="http://gamebanshee.com/news/static/EkFuuyuAVlcMIsxWMw.php">Gamebanshee's coverage</a> of the six revealed backgrounds, that actually functions. Another victory for text based over shiny graphics?
<br>
<blockquote> <b>City Elf</b>
<br>
You have always lived under the heavy thumb of your human overlords, but when a local lord claiming his "privilege" with the bride shatters your wedding day, the simmering racial tensions explode in a rain of vengeance.</blockquote>
<br>
Braveheart anyone?
<br>
<br>
Spotted at: <A HREF="http://gamebanshee.com/">Gamebanshee</A>
 

aries202

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Yes, it might be Braveheart, but on the DA forums this origin is known as the Lucia de Lammermoor origin. There's a reason the woman elf has a knife; she has just murdered her husband. (or the local lord)

Here's wikis take on the story in the opera by Donizetti:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucia_di_Lammermoor

I hope the elven bride also breaks out in song just like in the opera: (I've chosen the aria that sung in the fifth element - thought you might like it..)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MR6D7tL ... re=related

And actually, Bioware has now all 6 origins stories presented at their website.

http://dragonage.bioware.com/origins/

Of course, the City Elf origin could also been as a tribute, inspiration by or as a rip-off of a certain aspect of Don Giovabnni, the one part where Don Giovanni (tries to) seduce Zerlina, the young peasant maiden.
 

Hamster

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Looks like they fucked up the idea of origins. I hoped they will be used to establish player in the world, and Bio are using them to create cheap drama.
Spoiled wedding? I started playing 30 seconds ago, how am i supposed to care about my spouse if i know nothing about her?
 

Gay-Lussac

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The same way you cared about the middle aged guy leaving the vault.
By the way have you seen him?

Oh and can anyone tell me if I can be a human noble and a mage or do mages have to follow the mage origin?
 

Shannow

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Care about the Vaultdwellers/(tribal) village/siblings/(foster) parents/total strangers after a crash/vampire princes/farm/the other witchers/your memory/etc? No? Well, doesn't that suck for you.
 

Hamster

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Marcelo21 said:
Oh and can anyone tell me if I can be a human noble and a mage
I don't think so, mage origin will include some kind of initiation ritual and noble one will deal with treachery, i don't see how thic can be combined...
 

Hamster

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Shannow said:
Care about the Vaultdwellers/(tribal) village/siblings/(foster) parents/total strangers after a crash/vampire princes/farm/the other witchers/your memory/etc? No? Well, doesn't that suck for you.
Fail. Roll for Lore (Good RPG design) again.
 
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Hamster said:
Looks like they fucked up the idea of origins. I hoped they will be used to establish player in the world, and Bio are using them to create cheap drama.
Spoiled wedding? I started playing 30 seconds ago, how am i supposed to care about my spouse if i know nothing about her?

Bingo. It's the Gorion effect. It's hard to care about a character you have no background with and have just been introduced to 5 minutes ago. Better game drama is when a character you have been exposed to for a long time dies/betrays you/gets eaten, and more importantly, a useful character. Take for instance in BG2, when Yoshimo betrays you. The reason it hits at all, is because the player is losing a valuable resource, the only pure thief, and an NPC with great stats. It's not the melodramatic bullshit that works, it's targeting something that is fundamental to all players, resource management and use.

But it has to be applied right. Yoshimo worked because his betrayal only came if you had him in your party, and if he was in your party, chances are you considered him a valuable asset. But something like Mass Effect's Kaiden or Ashley choice wasn't all that great, because very few people would actually have both of them as favored party members, thus making it a simple decision of who to sacrifice. If it had instead calculated which two party members saw the most use up until that point and then made it a choice between them, it would have been a lot more poignant a choice.

Care about the Vaultdwellers/(tribal) village/siblings/(foster) parents/total strangers after a crash/vampire princes/farm/the other witchers/your memory/etc? No? Well, doesn't that suck for you.

Problem is that in most of those games you are referencing, there was a compelling personal motivation that is pretty much universal...survival. In Bloodlines, you were pretty much the Prince's bitch, and at his mercy. In Baldur's Gate, the assassins chasing you all over were a motivation to finish things up. In BG2 it was getting your soul back. With Dragon Age, too much of your character seems scripted. Rather than an opening vignette AoD style with choices, they seem to force emotions and actions onto your character. With the city elf, can my character do something other than go Charles Bronson on the lord's ass? What if I'm a totally lawful guy, and just let him do it with her because it is the law? What if I don't want the likely violent revenge forced on me by Bioware, and would rather sleep with his wife? What about telling the bride to be to run away, and run she does?
 

Hamster

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Edward_R_Murrow said:
Care about the Vaultdwellers/(tribal) village/siblings/(foster) parents/total strangers after a crash/vampire princes/farm/the other witchers/your memory/etc? No? Well, doesn't that suck for you.

Problem is that in most of those games are referencing, there was a compelling personal motivation that is pretty much universal...survival.
Also, in those game prologue was very small and insignificant element, it was just a way to get the game started and move to the good stuff. In Fallout all the "you must save us" drama was confined to the short movie, and after that you started already outside the vault, with developers realising that exploring the world is what you want, not cheap drama.

In DA, origins is the single most hyped element of the game.
 

NOVD

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It's good to see that the origins have full stories behind them. I had feared that the origins would just be different training exercises depending on which origin you've chosen.

The origins stories provide some reason for the story to start. It's good that such a segment has had a good piece of time devoted to it. Dragon Age after all has a well-defined main quest. Hopefully we'll get a well-defined reason to go on it.
 

DemonKing

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Marcelo21 said:
Oh and can anyone tell me if I can be a human noble and a mage or do mages have to follow the mage origin?

I seem to remember hearing that mages have to follow the mage option.
 

AlanC9

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Hamster said:
. In Fallout all the "you must save us" drama was confined to the short movie, and after that you started already outside the vault, with developers realising that exploring the world is what you want, not cheap drama..

Sure, but DA is a Bio game. And if you like Bio games, the cheap drama is exactly what you're there for, not the world exploration.
 

Gay-Lussac

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Well that sucks I wanted to play a noble mage.
Oh and yoshimo's betrayal was a very wtf moment for me BG 2 being the first rpg I played.
 

Forest Dweller

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Drama can be good if it is implemented correctly. Sometimes Bioware does a good job with this, othertimes not so much. I'll remain cautiously optimistic on DA:O until it comes out, and then judge for myself.
 

feighnt

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Edward_R_Murrow said:
With the city elf, can my character do something other than go Charles Bronson on the lord's ass? What if I'm a totally lawful guy, and just let him do it with her because it is the law? What if I don't want the likely violent revenge forced on me by Bioware, and would rather sleep with his wife? What about telling the bride to be to run away, and run she does?

the character you control, as the city elf, IS the wife who is going to be raped, not the husband. this is made clearer on the bioware site, which goes into greater detail on the characters and the societies they live in.

and, i'm sure you dont have the choices you mentioned (with a little rewording so it's you who submits to the lord, etc) - i also dont see this as necessarily bad. i think everyone knows perfectly well that this game is likely to have few choices/meaningful choices - rather, it will focus on telling a central story. and, frankly, i see nothing necessarily wrong with this, there's clearly a place in the video gaming world for games of this type, and it doesnt make them bad per se (what makes them bad is if they're done poorly). yes, having games which are much more free-form can be quite delightful, and, yes, we're in short supply of them, but i see no reason to get upset over the simple fact that a game is being made which is *not* the sort you're as interested in. they keep pumping out sports games and racing games, and, although i'm not particularly interested in these kinds of games, i see no reason to complain simply due to the fact that they exist.

as for the ability of the game to emotionally affect a person, i think it all depends on how it's done - the mere fact that it happens early in the story (precisely how early is uncertain - nobody here has played the game, there is altogether far too much conjecture being employed in judgement of this game) does not mean it cannot be done well. i also believe it's curious to assume that the focus of the drama of the game will be all in the opening (who is to say that the drama of the opening is not meant to simply develop the character and to be of import in later parts of the game? again, too many assumptions, too much conjecture). i also think it curious that people would attack, within video games, dramatic techniques which are used often enough, and often enough *effectively*, in cinema. i WONT argue that most games, frankly, dont screw it up, simply because most games arent written as well as many movies(something which is hardly a necessity of the medium). but this is not to say that they may not do well this time, and there are other games which did it effectively, i believe (though i'm sure many of the people here may disagree on examples, but that's fair enough).

so, yeah. summing up my point: judging a game before it's out, based on bare-bones information, is disingenuous (and, in this case, just the *summary* of the information, as the gamebanshee info only quotes a relatively small part of what we've been given, not that we've been given loads anyway). and, further, if one judges a game (or whatever) to be bad, they ought to judge it more on its own terms, rather than due to the simple fact that it is not the sort of thing they like (ie: as it's illogical to complain that a fps is not, say, a strategy game, to use an extreme example, it is similarly illogical to complain that a game which surely few people expect to be a freer rpg with numerous, meaningful choices doesnt live up to these non-expectations. clearly this game is, first and foremost, a "drama rpg" or whatever the term may be).
 
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feighnt said:
the character you control, as the city elf, IS the wife who is going to be raped, not the husband. this is made clearer on the bioware site, which goes into greater detail on the characters and the societies they live in.

6a00c2251d19928e1d00e39xv6.jpg





thar we go...
 

Forest Dweller

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Applegate's Breasts said:
feighnt said:
the character you control, as the city elf, IS the wife who is going to be raped, not the husband. this is made clearer on the bioware site, which goes into greater detail on the characters and the societies they live in.

6a00c2251d19928e1d00e39xv6.jpg
You know, perhaps all of Bioware's talk of the game being "dark and gritty" isn't all bullshit afterall.
 

Dionysus

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Edward_R_Murrow said:
Rather than an opening vignette AoD style with choices, they seem to force emotions and actions onto your character. With the city elf, can my character do something other than go Charles Bronson on the lord's ass? What if I'm a totally lawful guy, and just let him do it with her because it is the law? What if I don't want the likely violent revenge forced on me by Bioware, and would rather sleep with his wife? What about telling the bride to be to run away, and run she does?
From my understanding, you would choose a different origin if you want a different backstory for your character.

I think this sounds pretty good so far. You can complain that there are only six options, but that variety is better than the one option that you get with most RPGs. Although they probably should have thrown in a generic lost-memory/fresh-out-of-prison origin that is available to any race.
 

Hamster

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Dionysus said:
I think this sounds pretty good so far. You can complain that there are only six options, but that variety is better than the one option that you get with most RPGs.
One good option is better than six retarded ones.
The concept of backstory in the way Bioware sees it is flawed at its core.
 

MetalCraze

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My god not this retarded mentality again:

"Well shit X is better than shit Y, while still being shit - all hail *insert developer here*"
 

Andhaira

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It DOES kind of suck that you are forced take the same background no mater your class/skills. For example, if you are an aelf you are stuck with the braveheart background, even if you play an elf 10 times.
 
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So far, it seems all the hype is about the overblown "background traits", with different, but exceptionally primitive and cliched, starting locations, and exact same game after that, sprinkled with a few surface, meaningless "origin" lines in dialogues.

I guess, something better is theoretically possible, but, given the past track record, BioWare's lost the benefit of the doubt in my eyes, to bother with holding my breath.
 

Shannow

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Edward_R_Murrow said:
Care about the Vaultdwellers/(tribal) village/siblings/(foster) parents/total strangers after a crash/vampire princes/farm/the other witchers/your memory/etc? No? Well, doesn't that suck for you.

Problem is that in most of those games you are referencing, there was a compelling personal motivation that is pretty much universal...survival. In Bloodlines, you were pretty much the Prince's bitch, and at his mercy. In Baldur's Gate, the assassins chasing you all over were a motivation to finish things up. In BG2 it was getting your soul back. With Dragon Age, too much of your character seems scripted. Rather than an opening vignette AoD style with choices, they seem to force emotions and actions onto your character. With the city elf, can my character do something other than go Charles Bronson on the lord's ass? What if I'm a totally lawful guy, and just let him do it with her because it is the law? What if I don't want the likely violent revenge forced on me by Bioware, and would rather sleep with his wife? What about telling the bride to be to run away, and run she does?
How did the assassin chasing me make me care for Gorion? You may have been the prince's bitch. I never felt compelled to do anything in bloodlines. The replay as malkavian was great but the first play sucked from a motivational standpoint. And if you played BG2 without BG1 why should you care about Imoen? If you neither care about Imoen nor about revenge there is no reason to follow Irenicus and get your soul stolen. And the comments were about caring, no?
It is a matter of execution and personal preference. If the audience is emotionally so stunted that they say "Why should I care about (see above) if I haven't built any relationship with the characters"? then there isn't much you can do as a dev than force the player into some guardian role whose duty it is to save the world or push him into some struggle for survival/freedom. It limits story options. Do you really want to be forced into a role or be chased by assassins in every single fucking game?
Now I seldomly care about characters that I don't know. If they get killid off, so what. But I don't whine about it. And I don't judge whether or not the fictional fates of game characters will touch me before I have played the game. I certainly won't post pathetic "fail" jibes at poeple who do not agree with me. (I'm looking at you, rodent.)
 

Hamster

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Shannow said:
Now I seldomly care about characters that I don't know. If they get killid off, so what. But I don't whine about it. And I don't judge whether or not the fictional fates of game characters will touch me before I have played the game. I certainly won't post pathetic "fail" jibes at poeple who do not agree with me. (I'm looking at you, rodent.)
Yoh have just used two most common and stupid bio fanboys excuses - "you haven't played the game yet" and "why do you whine?!". How about trying to understand other people's position instead?
 

Volourn

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FO sucked because I had no motivation to find the water chip or confront the master. Why should give a shit if the Vault 13 dinks all die? I didn't really know them, anyways. *yawn*
 

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