Dragon Age: Origins Review

Following the success of Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Knights, BioWare sought to create its own original fantasy RPG franchise. Initially called Chronicle, the series was inspired by Lord of the Rings and A Song of Ice and Fire. BioWare began building a demo of the game in 2002 and eventually revealed their new series, now called Dragon Age, in a trailer at E3 2004. The studio would spend the next five years developing the world, characters, story, and gameplay that would culminate in the release of Dragon Age Origins in 2009.

One of the biggest goals for this game was to achieve a crossover between two core audiences: fans of their earlier isometric CRPG titles like Baldur's Gate and a growing audience of console gamers who contributed to the success of more action-oriented RPGs like Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Fable, and Morrowind. It was to be a hybrid of old-school and new-school RPGs. The result was an interesting mixture of strategic combat, action, and cinematic storytelling. 

Dragon Age Origins is one of the most unique games I've ever played. While at a surface glance, it may look like just another generic fantasy strategy RPG, its lore, gameplay systems, writing, and characters really set it apart from everything else in the genre, even within the Dragon Age franchise itself.

Let's start off with character creation. Fans of OG Baldur's Gate or Pathfinder will notice that Origins offers far fewer choices in terms of race and class options for your character. There are two genders, three races (human, dwarf, and elf), and three classes (warrior, mage, and rogue). Some races are limited in class options as well; for instance, dwarves cannot be mages. But fewer choices don't necessarily mean this system is shallow.

In addition to race and class options, you will also choose your character's background, which dictates their origin story. What makes Dragon Age Origins unique are these stories. Depending on which background you select, you will play through a completely different prologue section of the game. 

This one to two-hour section of gameplay introduces your character's background and how they became involved in the events of the main story. There are six different origin stories you can experience: mage, human noble, city elf, Dalish elf, dwarf noble, and dwarf commoner. That's roughly six to 12 hours of unique prologue content that BioWare crafted for us to experience.

Even after four playthroughs of this game, I've still never played as a dwarf commoner or either of the elven backgrounds. Your background doesn't only affect the introductory section of the game. It also creates tons of unique interactions with NPCs throughout the main story as well. BioWare clearly put a huge amount of effort and care into crafting these differences, which greatly enhances the role-playing opportunities and replayability.

Many of the characters you meet in Dragon Age Origins will comment on your chosen background or race. You also have unique conversations with characters in the main story who you may have encountered first during the prologue. 

For instance, human nobles will have a unique dialogue with Rendon Howe, mages will remember Jowan and Cullen from the Circle Tower, and dwarf nobles will be related to Prince Balon, one of the main characters you interact with during the Orzammar arc of the story. 

These are just a few examples. In some cases, you'll even open up exclusive quest choices that are only available to certain backgrounds. I'll try to keep this vague to avoid spoiler territory, but just off the top of my head, I'm thinking of a couple of choices that are only possible with either mages or human noble characters.

Dragon Age Origins is really in a class of its own with its origin stories. The only other recent game I can think of that attempted something similar is Cyberpunk 2077, but Cyberpunk's three life path stories are much less fleshed out and impactful than BioWare's six origin stories in DAO.

Origin stories aside, let's talk about another important aspect of your character: dialogue. Selecting dialogue options is a core staple of RPGs, allowing you to give expression to your character insofar as possible within the options presented by the developers. Dragon Age Origins has a mix of spoken dialogue and text. 

NPCs are fully voiced and animated. However, the protagonist is silent, and dialogue is expressed through selecting text prompts on the screen. This is pretty standard stuff for many RPGs.

I have mixed feelings about silent protagonists, and there are clear pros and cons. The positives are you can imagine what your character sounds like, which will be more immersive for some players, or maybe it's better to say that you're not distracted by a voice that doesn't match the vision of your character. 

Also, the developers can generally include more dialogue options for your character, which allows for greater freedom of expression. 

This second part is definitely a huge bonus in Dragon Age Origins, where you'll often have as many as four to five different dialogue options per choice in a given conversation. I rarely felt like I wasn't able to say what I wanted my character the downsides of a silent protagonist are conversations can feel a bit disjointed, especially if the NPCs are fully voiced.

Also, it's more difficult to convey the emotional weight of your character's responses since much of that information would be better presented through tone of voice and facial expressions. In Dragon Age, the silent protagonist comes across as a bit awkward in cutscenes. In games like Skyrim, you are playing in first person and facing the NPC your character is speaking to, so choosing text options in dialogue doesn't break the immersion in conversations. But in Origins, the third-person camera focuses on your character's blank expression and closed mouth during cutscenes, making the scenes feel a bit strange to me.

Okay, let's talk about the elephant in the room: the combat in Dragon Age Origins. If I had to describe the combat in one word, it would be uninviting. If you mainly play games like Skyrim, The Witcher 3, Mass Effect, or modern Fallout games, for instance, then Origins will likely feel clunky and outdated to you. It certainly feels that way to me most of the time.

Dragon Age Origins has party-based strategy combat that masquerades as an action game. You may be momentarily fooled by the default over-the-shoulder camera or the nifty combat animations and finishers, but at the end of the day, the combat leans far more towards strategy and dice rolls than action. For some players, this combat is super appealing, but others may not be into it at all. It's really down to personal taste. If you don't like Origins' combat at first, you are not alone, but I encourage you to stick it out. Even if you don't connect with it initially, the story and characters are worth the effort, and the combat does get easier once you get familiarized with the systems.

Let's take a closer look at how combat works in this game. Origins uses a party-based real-time strategy combat system, complete with a tactical pause menu and two different camera perspectives: over the head and over the shoulder. 

Your party will consist of your main character plus up to three companions at a time. It's generally best to have a party that balances the three major class types: warriors, mages, and rogues. 

Warriors deal the most damage with basic attacks and are great at fighting at the front of your party. They also have higher constitutions and can wear heavy armor, which makes them greatly suited for drawing enemies' attention, while your mages and ranged characters deal damage or provide support from afar. 

Rogues are more nimble than warriors but can't deal or receive as much damage in general. However, with stealth abilities, they can circle around for backstabs, which deal massive damage. They are also incredibly useful for disabling traps, which can decimate your party if you aren't careful, and picking locks. These abilities make them an essential part of your group, so I recommend having at least one rogue in your party at all times.

Mages are extremely versatile in this game. They can provide support with healing, barriers, and other buffs to your party. They can also debilitate groups of enemies with area-of-effect stun effects like Mind Blast and Cone of Cold. Combine that with the ability to cast high-damage area-of-effect spells like Tempest and Blizzard, and you can sometimes end fights before they even begin.

So, you're working with a party of four, and there are several ways you can control the group in battle. You can only directly control one individual at a time, but you can switch between any of the four characters. You can also issue commands to each individual character or to the entire group. Companions also have highly customizable AI. For players who enjoy this level of control and detail, this gives you a lot of different options to micromanage each combat situation.

The combat can be quite difficult in this game at times. So, if you're new to the franchise, I recommend starting on easy difficulty. Easy in Dragon Age Origins is comparable to veteran difficulty in other games, and it's still common to get party wiped when an enemy scores a lucky critical hit or casts an ability that stun-locks your entire group.

Regardless of how you feel about the combat in Dragon Age Origins, I highly recommend that you stick with it to experience the true strengths of this game, which are the quests, characters, and writing. If you like games that combine compelling plotlines and characters with meaningful choices and consequences, then Dragon Age Origins is the game for you. 

Main quests and side quests alike often present the player with a variety of choices on how to resolve all kinds of conflicts. As a fan of the Mass Effect trilogy and someone who loves exploring a wide array of choices and outcomes, I find Dragon Age Origins really satisfying in this regard. Even minor side quests will give the player multiple ways to deal with the situation.

For example, you'll run across a homeless dwarf woman who tells you the sob story of how her family disowned her after she bore a casteless child. Hereditary casts make up the backbone of work and status in Dwarven society. The player has a bunch of ways to resolve this quest. You can convince her family to take her and her child back, convince the woman to take her baby and try to live on the surface, convince the local priest to provide a home for the mother and child in the Chantry, or even convince the woman to leave her baby for dead and return to her family alone. That's a lot of options for a random side quest you stumble upon.

Now, not all of the quests in this game are this detailed or provide this many choices, but it's illustrative of how much effort BioWare put into the game to give players the freedom and options to truly role-play in Dragon Age Origins.

The main quest line is also phenomenal. I don't want to go into too much detail because I'm afraid to spoil anything major, but suffice it to say that BioWare did a fantastic job creating a dramatic and interesting plot to follow in Dragon Age Origins.

And finally, no BioWare game would be complete without a great cast of companions to accompany you on your journey. If you're familiar with other BioWare games like the Mass Effect trilogy, KOTOR, or Baldur's Gate, then you'll immediately recognize that classic companion formula in Dragon Age Origins.

I wouldn't say that every companion is a 10 out of 10 in this game, but the best characters from Origins stack up well against other famous BioWare characters like Liara, Tali, Garrus, Bastila, Varric, etc. My personal favorites are Morrigan, Leliana, and Alistair, all of whom were incredibly well-written and well-acted characters with interesting backstories. Most of your companions also have a personal quest that delves deeper into their backstory before they join your crew.