Dragon Age How to Enjoy Dragon Age: Origins

[9ted6]

There is no way to enjoy DA:O. Get out now while you can.

You can't enjoy it but you can appreciate that it's not as bad as what Bioware offers now. Somebody brings out some cold McDonalds and you'll be overjoyed if the other three options are shit, trash and shitty trash on a plate.

 

[BosanskiSeljak]

wonder what kind of juvenile writers would make the main villain have really dark undershadow beneath his eyes, so that his ugly face SCREAMS look at me, im the fucking villain, in case you had any doubts.

Loghain is an antagonist, he is the literal inverse of the protagonist (in most ways you can play). He is not a hurr durr evil person, not in any sense, that's why you can end up recruiting him to your party.

The villains of the game are Howe on the personal level and the Archdemon as the macro threat (and in general darkspawn were always a backdrop threat to the true adventure of the game).

This holds true throughout the entire game, every scene you see with him. The one scene where he says something ominous shortly before betraying the king is the only time he gets anywhere close to sounding like the villain you describe.

DA:O is the peak of simple bioware writing but you somehow manage to miss the nuances in DAO. I shouldn't be surprised though, It's porky

 

[thesecret1]

How to Enjoy Dragon Age: Origins​

Oh, that's easy.
Step 1: time travel back to 2009, to the great RPG drought
Step 2: realize it's either DA:O, Mass Effect, Fallout 3, or a decade old RPGs you've played a million times already
Step 3: enjoy

Alternatively:
Step 1: Hit yourself in the head hard enough to forget everything after 2009, then continue as stated above

The appeal of DA:O was in that it was a half-decent RPG during a time when fuck all got released. Nowadays, with how many better titles have come out since, it looks pretty bad in comparison.

 

[BosanskiSeljak]

DA:O is still a top 20 RPG released since 2009.

 

[NecroLord]

wonder what kind of juvenile writers would make the main villain have really dark undershadow beneath his eyes, so that his ugly face SCREAMS look at me, im the fucking villain, in case you had any doubts.

Loghain is an antagonist, he is the literal inverse of the protagonist (in most ways you can play). He is not a hurr durr evil person, not in any sense, that's why you can end up recruiting him to your party.

The villains of the game are Howe on the personal level and the Archdemon as the macro threat (and in general darkspawn were always a backdrop threat to the true adventure of the game).

This holds true throughout the entire game, every scene you see with him. The one scene where he says something ominous shortly before betraying the king is the only time he gets anywhere close to sounding like the villain you describe.

DA:O is the peak of simple bioware writing but you somehow manage to miss the nuances in DAO. I shouldn't be surprised though, It's porky

Loghain was a pretty cool character.

 

[Grunker]

I know I'm asking for trouble bringing this up again, but how does one enjoy DA:O? what are the essential (difficulty) mods for DA:O? From what I can gather, the essential non-difficulty mods are the 4GB patch, Qwinn's fixes and Dain's fixes. A good-to-have mod is also the AP neural enhanced textures. What about difficulty, though? RAVAge seems too random to me, Increased Difficulty and Nightmare Plus seem stat bloated (which isn't necessarily bad, but you'd have to manually go through every encounter for that to satisfactory, not just a blanket increase to everything everywhere). Maybe Lemmings? I know people swear by Improved Atmosphere, but it really isn't good because it places random op items everywhere and it's dubious whether it improves the atmosphere in general. I find it kitschy even without the op items.

My experience with the only somewhat popular difficulty mod (Ravage) was very, very messy. The randomization actually works in its favor (it's really telling of how bad the DA itemization is that diablo loot is 100% an improvement), the problem is that the difficulty is extremely weird and geared toward hyperoptimization and gear grinding. To the point I ended up uninstalling it, unfortunately. It's really sad because DA:O has some gewd gameplay, but even half-way through the game it gets undercut completely by some of the most laughable balancing I think I've ever seen in an RPG.

 

[SomeGuyWithAnOpinion]

There is no way to enjoy DA:O. Get out now while you can.

You can't enjoy it but you can appreciate that it's not as bad as what Bioware offers now. Somebody brings out some cold McDonalds and you'll be overjoyed if the other three options are shit, trash and shitty trash on a plate.

Yeah but if you serve me bland white bread on a plate I don't have to eat it just because it's not 3-day-old rotten shit.

Dragon Age sucks. It's boring and barely playable. Mods can make it somewhat better but they can't really fix the core damage. This is the case regardless of the quality of their modern titles.

No matter how bad Bioware gets, Dragon Age will never be good. Quality is not a relative measurement.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

DA:O is still a top 20 RPG released since 2009.

RPGs released since 2009 that are significantly better than Dragon Ass: Origins:

Fallout: New Vegas
Dark Souls
Dark Souls 2
Witcher 2
Witcher 3
ELEX
Kingdom Come: Deliverance
Cyberpunk 2077
Battle Brothers
Expeditions: Conquistador
Expeditions: Viking
Shadowrun: Dragonfall
Shadowrun: Hong Kong
Shadowrun: Returns
Underrail
Age of Decadence
Jagged Alliance 3
Mount & Blade: Warband
Kenshi
Divinity 2

So even with your extra low bar, ... no.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

The opening vignette mechanic was probably the best thing about the game. The subplots from the prologue were more engaging than the main plot.

 

[Oberon]

The opening vignette mechanic was probably the best thing about the game. The subplots from the prologue were more engaging than the main plot.

True, but at the same time it is the most vivid memory of disappointment I have of the game after it devolved into easily massacring countless numbers of generic mooks alongside my character's aging mother.

 

[Ryan muller]

Wasteland 3 instead.

I would rather play DA:O 6 times before touching W3 again.

 

[Ryan muller]

So even with your extra low bar, ... no.

Shadowrun: Returns

Porky, please.

 

[Sweeper]

Cyberpunk 2077
Shadowrun: Dragonfall
Shadowrun: Hong Kong
Shadowrun: Returns
ELEX
Dark Souls
Dark Souls 2
Witcher 2
Witcher 3

>Better than DA:O
Come on bro.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

Yes, Shadowrun Returns is a much better game than Dragon Ass Origins. It's a simple RPG, but it does things well, the combat is fun, the setting is interesting, the story is ok-ish. Dragon Ass fails at all of those.

 

[Heroic Liberator]

SRR DF & HK and the Expeditions games were peak comfy.

 

[Ryan muller]

Yes, Shadowrun Returns is a much better game than Dragon Ass Origins. It's a simple RPG, but it does things well, the combat is fun, the setting is interesting, the story is ok-ish. Dragon Ass fails at all of those.

Bruh

From all those things the only thing it does better than DA:O is combat. Not even Kotor 1 gets as retarded of a plot as Returns do. How can a game be so short and still feels rushed as fuck?

Also, Shadowrun trilogy has a quite generic cyberpunk setting, it doesnt have much going on that you wouldnt see anywhere else, and the writing is pretty much PoE levels of exposition, althought people say HK is even worse in that regard, ill never know, lose the interest after Returns.

 

[Heroic Liberator]

lose the interest after Returns.

You should at least try DF. The original campaign was for all intents and purposes a test run for the system. DF and HK are both miles ahead.

 

[9ted6]

the setting is interesting

Shadowrun is quite possibly the dumbest TTRPG setting ever made.

 

[Ryan muller]

I was expecting a whole lot from Shadowrun, the idea of a cyberpunk setting that evolved from a fantasy one, with multiple races living together and magic being a thing seemed amazing, something like if Arcanum's setting progressed even more towards the future, what i got however is the embodiement of dull game design.

For once, the setting barely works realistically about racial tension and racism in that universe, which would be a thing considering how cyberpunk usually goes and how fantasy naturally will tackle on such subjects due to the whole different racial aspects and cultures clashing with one another. this however, ignores it completely. magic barely has any deep lore and the explanation for how it manifests is extremely lame, specially when they start to delve into shamans and such, as a whole, the setting feels like a generic cyberpunk setting in which characters do act like brothers in poverty all the time, making it feel extremely childish for a cyberpunk setting

Combat is pretty simple but its most decent aspect as it is basically xcom but without the complexity of simulating destruction, instead very focused on skill and magic usage, its quite fun and you have complete party control (which is an advantage over fallout) but magic is so simple that i cant help but feel the system lost lots of chances to get way deeper than it is

All the simplicity is also maintained within its system, which is dissapointing to say the least as nothing matters outside of combat and a few mostly irrelevant charisma checks, why irrelevant? because the story is surprinsingly linear for an RPG, no multiple endings nor branches, theres barely side quests in this thing and this also applies to itemization which is not only based on tiers, but has all equipment from a same class doing EXACTLY the same thing but with higher damage value from tier to tier.

You add up the fact the toolset is quite dull compared to something like Neverwinter nights's toolset and you have pretty much a kintergarden roleplaying game that is almost devoid of pros, one of the very few being the pacing of its story, which is pretty good for the most part but also falls appart because of its writing, which as mentioned before, is pathetic... but suffice to say, the main plot revolves around a murder mistery and it ends in the most generic way possible.

So, i will mever replay it, maybe i can try SR dragonfall which i heard is a lot better than this one. This one however, was shit

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

>Better than DA:O
Come on bro.

I liked all the Shadowrun games much better than I liked Dragon Age: Origin, but I agree with the others that the first one was the weakest. But Porky also left out:

ATOM
Wasteland 3
Grim Dawn
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord
Titan Quest
Torchlight II
Ultimate ADOM

 

[Butter]

New Vegas
Dark Souls
Underrail
Kenshi
Grimoire
KotC 2
Age of Decadence
Dungeon Rats
M&B Warband
Pillars of Eternity
Pillars of Eternity 2
Realms of Antiquity
Nox Archaist
Kingdom Come Deliverance
Tales of Maj'Eyal
Disco Elysium
ATOM RPG
Archolos
Battle Brothers
Kingmaker

 

[Wasteland]

Step one: watch the trailer for Dragon Age 4. Resist the urge to click out before it's over.
Step two: DAO will now look like a sublime work of art. Enjoy.

Coincidentally, this same trick will work for any game you care to place in step two.

I have to agree with those who are lukewarm on DAO. I enjoyed it when I first played, but the world was a different place 15 years ago. I was a different person 15 years ago. When I tried to replay DAO more recently, I bounced off of it after a handful of hours. The first bits were ok, the origin story segueing into the darkspawn battle and the Grey Warden ritual and teaming up with Alistair to fight in the tower, and then I think there's a miniature quest hub in the small town where you find Sten, etc--that was fine too, but inevitably you get to the part where the game expects you to spend an hour at the campsite, exhausting every companions' dialogue options for fear of missing out on "content." Then you remember that you will be expected to do this multiple times, that the campsite-dialogue-whack-a-mole loop is in fact a staple of Bioware games, going back at least as far as KOTOR, and suddenly the siren call of uninstall.exe becomes irresistible.

DAO does a few things right, mostly with respect to setting a distinct, and dark, tone. The main story is well crafted, if not particularly well paced, narratively coherent in a way that we don't often see these days. Gameplay has some depth and difficulty. But I don't think DAO has aged especially well, in part because it serves as an unpleasant reminder of pathological trends that have taken off since. The aforementioned campsite-dialogue loop is probably the closest thing Bioware has to an enduring legacy; it's popped up in countless other RPGs since, and we've seen its logical end point. What started as a tolerable-but-lazy side activity, designed to flesh out occasionally interesting secondary characters, giving the player a sense of camaraderie to enhance the gameplay, ultimately morphed into an endless procession of tedious San-Francisco/Brooklynite-Millennial-barista romance simulators, presented as the main course.

Codexers often say that the introduction of CRPG romances was a disaster for the human race gaming. I agree with that, but I'll take it a step farther: the whole concept of companions, as we now know it, should be abolished. No more exposition dumps, no more motley crews of "complex and mysterious" misfits whose asses need to be kissed to progress the plot. Just give me a couple of bros who throw out the occasional comment in the course of normal gameplay, while we're adventuring together. If you want to weave a companion story in with a side quest, be my guest, but let's dispense with the idea that I have to sit through 15 boring conversations with the guy first.

 

[BosanskiSeljak]

So in these lists you see Cyberpunk, Pillars of Eternity, Disco Elysium, Witcher 2, non-RPGs like Dark Souls, etc. Then there's games that are only put in due to personal tastes or being wowed by production values. I.e. Witcher 3 or the shadowrun games.

Also retards like Porky who've shown previously in the thread they somehow can't grasp simple, slightly nuanced, Bioware writing.

DA:O is from a technical standpoint and RPG lense is the best Bioware game.

I gave a 15 year buffer to name 20 RPGs and these are the ones you guys had to resort to? Thanks for proving my point, or at least proving the point of Porky being a retard. I gave a layup to you and you missed the net by 20 metres. I would've done a better job arguing against my own claim lol

 

[Silverfish]

simple, slightly nuanced, Bioware writing.

"It's a party! Grab a whore, boys! Hahahahahahaha!"

 

[Ryan muller]

Pillars of Eternity
Pillars of Eternity 2

i just started PoE 2, but PoE 1 wasnt even close to DAO, i actually dont know how you stood that game and cant stand DAO, theres a bunch of trash mobs in PoE 1 on top of the most expositive dialogue in the entire medium. its very bad.

New Vegas

Writing is better, but the game is unplayable on that engine, or atleast close to that w/o mods

Age of Decadence
Dungeon Rats

Agreed

Disco Elysium

Agreed

Kingmaker

Too much bloat