Dragon Age:Inquisition REVIEW

Note:  This post will be as spoiler free as possible.  I want to write a second one just to talk about the narrative, why it poorly matches the gameplay, plus the overall story including the ending, so there will be spoilers in that one.  This is just about the basics.

I have always been lukewarm on Dragon Age despite playing all three.  I thought Dragon Age:Origins was a well written but flawed game.  I thought Dragon Age 2 was okay but weirdly paced and had awful characters.  Dragon Age:Inquisition, however, was the time for Dragon Age to shine....and it largely didn't.

DA:I picks up pretty quickly after the ending of DA2 (maybe a year later? I never understood the timeframe).  The Mage vs. Templar war has been raging.  Peace talks called the "Conclave" which included The Chantry's (this games worldwide church) Divine (Pope), was supposed to end it but it gets interrupted by an explosion killing everyone except your character.  He/she becomes known as the Herald of Andraste (Jesus) and acquires a magical hand print that lets he/she close rifts, including a big one called "The Breach", that are basically portals to "The Fade", where demons and spirits live AWW FUCK IT.

Your character is mysteriously given a magic power to close portals from hell.  Got it?  The Chantry doesn't believe you, so you break off and create the Inquisition and build an army to fight the demons coming through the portals.

Hell is Green.  Also, from the sky.

Speaking of characters, the supporting cast is MUCH improved over DA2.  Varric is back and he's my bro, but the game is short on DA2 characters (except for SPOILER).  Cassandra is back and shes still got a stick up her ass although she opens up later on.  New characters like Iron Bull and Sera are fun.  Even Solas, who I hated at first, gradually opens up.  The only bad character is Blackwall who Grey Warden, Grey Warden, have you guys ever Grey Wardened before?  Even his voice actor seems bored.

You also have three advisers.  They are hugely important to the story and two of them are new.  One is Cullen, the leader of your army, and another is Josephine, who is your ambassador and the dullest romance option I've taken in a Bioware game.  The other is Leliana your spymaster, who is from Dragon Age:Origins.  Interestingly, it's possible to kill Leliana in DA:O, except that she is a huge part of this game and Bioware explains this by not explaining it at all.  (I didn't kill her but that is the most phoned in explanation I have ever seen).

Your Spymaster is NOT a romance option because she's kind of a nun, spy, assassin...wait

The game itself takes place in several huge open world areas that are not interconnected.  Every place you unlock has a reason to go there too, usually regarding the enemy either holding the area, or invading it because they are looking for something.  This game justifies why you need to go into a new area.  Even after completing the main objective, there is several other good reasons for being there.  You can capture keeps, storm enemy strongholds, close...like...a lot of rifts.  And...side quests.

This game has a Kingdoms of Amalur:Reckoning number of side quests. In fact, the game is mostly side quest.  It's also the biggest flaw of this game, as far too many of these side quests are "go get this thing" or "go kill this guy" or "drop off this thing at another thing for a reward".  These side quests seem to have little or nothing to do with the main story.  Many of these have me questioning why I am doing these in the first place considering who my character is (See second post, coming soon).  The reward for most side quests is either XP, Power points which are used to unlock new areas but after the 1/3rd mark you will have more Power than you know what to do with, or "Influence" points.  Influence is, uh, I think like War Assets from Mass Effect 3?  I don't know.  I played 70 hours of this game and I don't know.

GORGEOUS SCENERY...what am I doing here again?

Another reward for side quests are loot, which are rendered meaningless once you get into the AWESOME crafting system.  It's introduced way too early in the game, when you can't craft shit, but it's fantastic a little later on.  Once you collect enough resources, as well as some runes, you can make some sweet ass gear.  One desert area has you looting some hard to get too Dwarven ruins.  I sold ALLLLL of it because the stuff I crafted was insanely better.  This is late game stuff too.  I played as a dual-wield rouge and crafted two daggers that were something a character 10 levels higher should wield.  I rocked them for the rest of the game.

Outside of Bioware characters and the open world/side quest quagmire, the 3rd major part of this game is the War Table.  It's the most unique part of this game and it's really cool...if not quite executed as well as it could have been.  For every War Table mission, you can assign one of your 3 advisers.  The problem is that the missions run in REAL TIME.  They range from 5 minutes to 40 HOURS!  I always tried to assign the long ones before I turned the game off that way they would be done when I booted up the game the next day or two.  The rewards are often terrible, just like the side quests, and some unlock more side quests just to piss me off a little more.

The War Table looks like it was built from a ski lodge in Aspen, Colorado.

That said, I still like the War Table.  It made the war seem far larger in scope than most RPG's can do.  You are often sending agents into parts of the world you never see in this game.  Sometimes the missions are in Kirkwall, the setting for Dragon Age 2.  Sometimes they are in Tevinter, Antiva, or Nevarra.  You never go to these places in the game (Almost all of it is in Orlais, some in Ferelden).  It just increases the scope and epicness of what you are doing.  Too bad the War Table liked to CRASH ON ME ALL THE GODDAMN TIME,

I would be remiss to not mention the CONSTANT stability problems I had with this game.  Texture pop-in was so bad I got weirdly used to it.  NPC's would randomly appear or disappear.  I thought it was just because I was playing on PS3 but a friend of mine had crashing problems on her Xbox One as well.  This game crashed on me 10 times, always during the auto-save (and no, you can't turn it off, I checked.  Not like that option would excuse this).  I've read reports that the PC version of this game is also buggy as hell and trying to control this game with a keyboard and mouse is like trying to perform surgery with chopsticks and hand grenades.  This is after 2 PATCHES too.  Is this going to be fixed?  I'm worried about Mass Effect "4".

That said, Dragon Age:Inquisition is an okay game.  Not great, not bad, just meh.  One of the major hallmarks of any Bioware game is choice, and it plays a key role here too.  No, not every choice matters as much but you know what?  That's life.  A choice you think is major may end up being minor, while a minor choice may end up being much larger than anticipated.  Bioware games, especially Mass Effect 3, often get ripped for player choice being unimportant in the long run and I think that is unfair.  Choices rarely go the way we expect....in my opinion.

Although....

If you include the open world nature of this game, then those choices are still bullshit.

Read my spoiler heavy PART 2 for more, coming soon.

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