Dragon Age: Origins - Combat and Interview

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Shir'le E. Illios
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Dragon Age: Origins - Combat and Interview

Post by Shir'le E. Illios »

I've got two more Dragon Age: Origins articles for you.

The first is an [url=http://uk.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/dragonage ... s:2nr84jyd]article on GameSpot[/url:2nr84jyd] explaining some of the combat styles you can choose from in the game. It's completely spoiler-free as it only talks about combat and not about story.

Here's an excerpt:

[quote:2nr84jyd]There's a good variety of combat talents in Dragon Age, including talent trees that are exclusive to your character's initial choice of character class (warrior or rogue, in this case), your character's advanced character class (including high-level advanced classes such as the templar warrior and assassin rogue), and a suite of talents specific to combat styles. Interestingly, while talents can be increased over time as you gain experience levels and talent points to invest, combat styles refer only generally to different ways to equip your character--specifically, with a one-handed weapon and shield; or with a bow or crossbow; or with dual weapons, or (exclusively for warriors) with a mighty two-handed weapon.[/quote:2nr84jyd]
The second article is an [url=http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/74164:2nr84jyd]interview at TenTonHammer[/url:2nr84jyd] with Lead Designer Mike Laidlaw. There aren't really any spoilers in it, though it does give a bit more of a description on the Dwarf Common origin at some point (not talking about the story so much as more the situation you're in).

Here's an excerpt (from elsewhere in the article):

[quote:2nr84jyd][b:2nr84jyd]Ten Ton Hammer: What drove you to make this game so much darker than Neverwinter Nights and Baldur's Gate? They were D&D based products and you were constrained a bit by the license, but why did you decide to make it so much darker?[/b:2nr84jyd]

[b:2nr84jyd]Laidlaw:[/b:2nr84jyd] To be quite frank, what we're seeing - and what we recognized in ourselves - is a maturation of the gamer. As a company, we've gone from a bunch of young bucks working in a garage to a group of adults in their 30s with kids. With that in mind, I think there's a shift in thinking where people want something a bit more mature to chew on. They want something challenging in both the gaming and decision-making sense.

So our initial decision was to make this more mature game, but then our next decision was to hone that choice. We wanted something a little more realistic, a little grittier, than just having gore for gore's sake. While there's still magic - and that's not "real" - at the same time it's got themes of betrayal that you might not explore in a happier game. There's so much rich drama there, why should we back away from it?

That ultimately made us challenge ourselves. We wanted to know if we could do it in a respectful and contextual way. We didn't want it to be the arbitrary inclusion of sex and violence; obviously people procreate and obviously people die in wars.[/quote:2nr84jyd]
A lot of what Mike says in that article is precisely why Dragon Age: Origins is currently at the top of my "want to play [i:2nr84jyd]now[/i:2nr84jyd]" list. Only two more months to wait.


[[url=http://uk.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/dragonage ... s:2nr84jyd]link[/url:2nr84jyd]] to GameSpot article on combat.
[[url=http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/74164:2nr84jyd]link[/url:2nr84jyd]] to TenTonHammer interview with Mike Laidlaw.


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Shir'le
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-= Shir'le E. Illios =-
Chosen of Eilistraee
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