E3 - We recently got our hands on Dragon Age: Origins at E3. The game has all the trappings of a great RPG; elves, dragons, weapons, stats, sex, dragons and everyone's favorite, branching dialog. (No word yet on actual dragon sex.) Luckily, we got a really good look at the game with both a lengthy presentation as well as the chance to play for about a half hour.
During the course of the demo, we got an outline of the back story. In a land where dragons still roam, many are too distracted by the giant fire breathing lizards to remember an even greater threat; the arch-demon and his dark spawn, the blight. They haven't been sighted in centuries, but an ancient order known as the Grey Wardens keeps a vigilant watch against their return. Well, the dark spawn are back, so it's time for you to step into the boots of an epic hero. You'll join the ranks of the Grey Wardens and kick all sorts of fantastical butts, while finding treasure items with crazy names, and getting it on with elf girls.
The demo began on this last romantic note, with our hero surveying his party which was camped around a fire in the wilderness. One party member is Liliana the archer. She's the good, wholesome type, and she likes it when you do good heroic things. So much so, that she'll even be your girlfriend. Awwww.
In the back of the camp is Morrigan's tent. Morrigan is the naughty sorceress who wears leather bodices and not much else. You give her a grimoire because you know she likes to read, and then she complains that her tent is too cold. You offer to help out with that, and then the game cuts to a brief scene of you two getting it on.
After you fool around with Morrigan, you go talk to Liliana who is confused and disappointed by the loud sex sounds that were obviously just emanating from Morrigan's tent. She asks you to decide between her and Morrigan. The demonstrator chose Morrigan and alienated Liliana. We are hopeful that you can somehow choose both. After all, whose fantasy includes awkward break-ups and depressing sexual consequences?
After breaking up with Liliana, the demo went back in time to the quest for the book that makes Morrigan want you to warm up her tent. The quest is to kill Morrigan's mother, Flemeth. She is a bog hag. You talk some smack, pick a fight, and then she transforms into a giant dragon.
The fight took place entirely in real time, as the developer switched between four party members on the fly to slay the beast. One character turned into a spider and attacked, and one of two melee characters was slain. The demoer then transferred control to the healer, resurrected the melee character, and then resumed chopping at the dragon's flanks. The fight ended when one character buried his sword in the dragon's head and road it to the ground like a dying fire hose.
That marked the end of the demonstration, and the beginning of our hands-on time with the game. We stepped into the shoes of an elven warrior exploring a cave with an uptight spell caster named Merrill. We're looking for a guy named Tamten. Evidently, we were all checking out a magic mirror. Tamten touched it, we were all knocked out, and when we woke up, Tamten was gone.
The controls are elegant. The B, Y and X buttons are mapped to abilities and the A button is an action button. By holding the left bumper we can switch between two tiers of abilities mapped to the B, Y and X buttons, so we have access to six abilities total. We can also switch characters by pulling the L trigger, and we can quaff a health potion by pressing the right bumper. With the controls in hand, we venture into the dungeon.
We encounter genlocks, which look a lot like orcs. These guys are evidently dark spawn. We run up and attack as the warrior. One of our abilities is a stun, so we open up with that, and then execute a kind of whirling blade attack while our spell caster shoots ice bolts. After dispatching a few waves of genlocks, we encounter a man named Duncan in a chamber with a mirror. Duncan is a grey warden, and he tells us that our friend Tamten is too far gone to rescue, because the magical mirror he touched is actually a device of immense evil. Duncan destroys the mirror, and we all return to our elven village.
Duncan and the keeper of the elf grove converse about the evil mirror. Next, the keeper lady tells me to go talk to the elf priest about a service for Tamten. When I tell the priest about Tamten, he waxes poetical about life and death, then asks me if I would join him in telling a story of heroism to the children of the village. Since slapping him is not an option, I respond with a flat "No." From there, Duncan the grey warden tells me to come with him, since I now have the plague and need a cure, and he needs someone who is good with swords to help him kill stuff.
And as far as we can tell, that is the beginning of one of the origins in Dragon Age: Origins. From what we've heard, Dragon Age will have many different starting points, and we can't wait to see them all when the game ships for the PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 on October 20.
