Nostalgic Games: Dragon Age: Origins

If you ask me what I remember about 2009, there aren’t many things I can name. To begin with, the death of Michael Jackson, which shocked both me personally and the whole world as a whole. I will also remember the controversial awarding of the first black US President Barack Obama with the Nobel Peace Prize… in advance (believe me, I myself don’t understand why my memory retains such information). But, as a gamer, I can’t help but mention the release of Dragon Age: Origins, which amazed me with its world and gameplay! After excellent sales and praise from both players and critics, Bioware released two sequels that I did not like at all. I can admit that I didn’t even really start playing them, realizing very quickly that they were “different.” Therefore, I regularly return to Origins, considering it not only the best in the series, but also one of the key role-playing games for at least the last 20 years.

Today I want to tell you interesting facts about the development of such a significant project for the industry and, by posting a build with the game and a set of modifications (separately), let you feel nostalgic on your own. These mods hardly change the game itself, they just make the graphics and gameplay better, additionally fixing bugs left after official patches.

Many of you may object: “What kind of old-fag gaming is this!” And perhaps they will be right. Therefore, I will explain: I mentally noted to myself that games released before approximately 2010 fall into this category. I am sure that this project left a nostalgic echo in the hearts of most people, allowing them to remember dozens of wonderful hours spent in this game. I hope that my article will not only be useful to you informationally, but will also give you a pleasant feeling after reading it.

Who

I already talked about the Bioware studio itself, its creators and how it came into being in a recent article about Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic, so I won’t repeat myself. Today I want to focus on how the development process of Dragon Age: Origins proceeded and what difficulties the creators faced.

Initially, the game was developed without a specific idea and without a clear vision of what the end result should be. Subsequently, the game’s screenwriter, Daniel Erickson, admitted: “When the development of the project lasted more than a year, the game did not have a name, and there were definitely no dragons. No one could really say what exactly this project was about. Despite the fact that a ton of story content had already been prepared, not even one page of the brief or any description of the upcoming product had been made.” A strange situation arose in which the writers wrote, and wrote a lot, but it all happened rather disjointedly, which is why the plot and the game world did not always fit together.

Interesting fact: The developers do not hide the fact that they wanted to create a project in a dark fantasy atmosphere, distancing themselves as much as possible from the traditional. And they were greatly influenced by the now almost cult writer George R. R. Martin – author of a whole series of novels “Song of Ice and Fire”, which will later be used as the basis for the series “Game of Thrones”.

At a certain stage of development, the creators were offered to change the essence of the game, rethink its world and greatly rewrite the plot, because gamers supposedly dream of becoming real heroes with a capital letter, they would not be interested in playing such a dark game! And when their ideas were presented to their bosses, they heard, “Do we really want to release a dark fantasy game? Do you think anyone will buy this? As you read these lines, keep in mind that the Game of Thrones series had not yet come out and created an unimaginable furore, and The Witcher had not yet become a cult role-playing game. It was considered a niche genre.

Fortunately, they managed to defend their vision of the project and continue development in the direction in which it was carried out all this time.

The creators themselves say the reason for the success of their brainchild is that they did not try to repeat someone else’s ideas, but tried to do something new. A few years before the release, Mass Effect had already been released, which gained a huge army of fans. An action role-playing game, it was not exactly the studio’s typical game: innovative and ambitious. It seemed that such projects were the future of Bioware. But Dragon Age: Origins came out, which was perceived as a throwback to the past. The developers initially set themselves the goal of creating Baldur’s Gate 3, but in a new universe, and they did it perfectly. They took all the best from their predecessor and added many new ideas!

It will be interesting to know that the game publisher, Electronic Arts, did not expect anything from the new project, so they did not think much about a sequel. It is for this reason that a completely unambiguous ending was added, closing the plot without any hints of continuation. But the players liked the role-playing game in the spirit of the “old school” so much that talk about a sequel immediately began.

The developers were eager to ditch the various Dungeons & Dragons mechanics that had been featured in their previous projects. Another important part of the concept was to develop the game on an updated version of the engine from Neverwinter Nights – Aurora Engine. But this was never destined to happen, since instead a new one was developed, called Eclipse Engine. These changes greatly slowed down the development of the project, as it was necessary to abandon many developments and features such as the multiplayer mode. Who knows, maybe the game would have been released much earlier if not for this decision…

But this was not the main problem of programmers. As many team members recall, the number of different glitches in the game was simply off the charts! Testing took thousands of hours, 180 people spent an incredible amount of time trying to catch all sorts of bugs. Daniel Fedor (lead technical artist) shared an interesting development story: “Once Duncan’s head was given incorrect physical properties, which is why, when I spawned him for testing, his head fell to the ground and rolled, and because of the tuft of hair, hitting the ground, she was twitching all over and looked like a fish thrown ashore.”

Well, I can hardly surprise you by saying that the development of the game in the mid-2000s was carried out with constant crunch through blood, sweat and tears. But the authors of Dragon Age: Origins, despite the mostly positive and warm memories of those times, say that it was not at all easy for them. People literally lived in their offices, working late and eating pizza. No one will deny that working in such conditions is terrible, but now we can at least say that everything was not in vain and the efforts of hundreds of participants materialized into a great game!

Plot

The plot centers on a kingdom inhabited by representatives of various races: from elves, dwarves and humans that are quite typical for the fantasy genre, to a new race invented specifically for the project – the Qunari. Each of the nationalities has a deep history, thanks to which one can trace the persecuted motives. Moreover, the depiction of races is not always as formulaic as in most “classic fantasy”. The same elves in DA: Origins are not a powerful, cunning and arrogant people who weave intrigues and play their political games with other races on equal terms, but a culture defeated and enslaved by people. Most elves are either nomadic or work as servants in the cities of their conquerors, regularly facing oppression and xenophobia.

This kingdom is attacked by the Blight – an event when the creatures of darkness emerge from the underground depths and with their huge mass attack all living things, poisoning the earth and drying up water sources, infecting living beings and turning them into their own kind.

The game begins with the choice of gender, race and backstory, which, unlike other projects, not only gives certain bonuses to the character and new answer options in dialogues, but also has a unique prologue that allows you to understand the path your character has taken and gives you the opportunity to look at it from different angles to the world. Regardless of the parameters set at the start, you become a Gray Guardian – a member of the order who not only fights the Blight, but carries a piece of this ancient evil within. To cope with the threat hanging over the world and try to stop the advance of the army of darkness, you need to gather around you as many supporters as possible and receive support from the rulers of all races and the magical order. After a few hours of play, a whole world will open up. You are free to choose in what order and how to complete the task, because what the unfolding events will lead to depends only on you. And these are not empty words – the decisions made will really affect individual characters, cities and the world as a whole, fortunately there are many different endings.

In your travels you will visit forests, abandoned labyrinths of gnomes, small villages and huge cities and fight not only the creatures of pestilence, but also other dangerous enemies. Actually, this is what the gameplay is based on. Travel across the global world map, explore various locations, complete tasks, battles and, of course, level up yourself and your players.

If you love The Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones, then you will surely love the world of Dragon Age: Origins. Despite the dissimilarity of the plot tropes, there is something about it that reminds me of Tolkien’s famous book or film, only darker and more depressing. Watch the video and I think you will understand what I mean.

Even today it looks very epic and mesmerizing, but imagine how gamers’ jaws dropped more than a decade ago.

Gameplay

Since Dragon Age is primarily a game, and not a book, in addition to an interesting plot, it is very important how it can captivate with its game mechanics. So what is so compelling about the gameplay, and why is it worth diving into now, at the end of 2023?

Let’s start with the fact that there is a good feeling of progress here: you rise from the very bottom, in the process becoming an increasingly significant figure, acquire associates, find rare and useful equipment, improve combat and social skills. The game perfectly conveys the feeling of real participation in events, as if you find yourself in the shoes of the Gray Guardian and begin to influence what is happening, without feeling that you are just another stereotyped hero saving the world. Dragon Age: Origins captivates with its realism! This is a dark fantasy, as many might say, a fairy tale, but what happens in it very often has the logic of the real world: hopelessness, the absence of a clear truth and the complexity of moral choices that entail consequences. Regularly facing the injustice of this world and being in eternal attempts to do everything right, sooner or later you will realize that this is unlikely to work out, so you will have to choose the lesser of two (or more) evils. This is what allows you to immerse yourself even more in the events taking place, fighting for the fate of this world.

Before starting the story about the battles themselves, it’s worth focusing on the role-playing system. There are 3 classes at your disposal (mage, warrior and robber), each of which has four subclasses (two of them are available initially, the rest you can learn from teachers you meet, from books you find, or after completing tasks). You can make your first choice of specialization at level seven, and your second at level fourteen.

With each promotion of your heroes, you will receive stat points, which you are free to spend on character development at your discretion. At the same time, you will also be awarded skill points and ability points. The former will be useful mainly outside of combat, allowing you to conduct dialogues more convincingly, brew various potions, create traps and dangerous poisons. Others will unlock new combat abilities that you can direct at anyone who gets in your way! A fly in the ointment for me – a fan of games such as, for example, PoE, is not a very large number of these same skills. Yes, it cannot be said that there are very few of them, but I would like there to be more of them…

Well, now we’ve equipped ourselves, distributed the characteristics – it’s time to go into battle! And, rushing into the heat of battle, we can make sure that battles take place in real time with the possibility of an active pause, which helps us slowly think about the situation and give orders to the squad, activating skills or magic spells. If you can control one of the heroes yourself, then the remaining members of your group act in battle depending on “Tactics”. These are special behavior patterns (macros) that regulate the reaction of the ward to a particular event in the battle (if you played Final Fantasy XII, then you know what I mean). If you manage to set everything up correctly, then in most battles you will completely lose the need to control the actions of your subordinates. If your health drops below 40%, have the mage use the “Heal” spell. The archer is being attacked in close combat – let him switch to melee weapons. If you are fighting a boss who has minions, attack the enemy with the lowest health first. The magician is running out of mana – use the “Drain Mana” magic. And you can really come up with a lot of such situations!

I think I shouldn’t even describe the battles themselves and try to talk about how bloody and spectacular they are. It is enough just to show some gif with a cut-out so that you can feel the spirit of the battles. In fact, there is nothing special in the combat mechanics; in this regard, the game is not unique; on the contrary, I can say that sometimes your players get overwhelmed, although this happens quite rarely. The combat encounters themselves are almost always very dynamic, even taking into account the fact that sometimes you will pause the battles. An interesting point is that you are free to control your squad not only in isometry, but also using a third-person view, which is very helpful in certain cases. And the cherry on the cake is the finishing move system, which allows you to play a special animation of killing an enemy, which is activated with a small chance (oldfags may remember Fallout 1 and 2 with similar game mechanics).

In my humble opinion, Dragon Age: Origins has some of the best dialogue between party members in any role-playing game. The characters are constantly teasing each other, discussing past events or their past (here one of hundreds of examples). Sometimes you will find it funny, and sometimes you will feel really sad. All this allows you to feel that you are not traveling with stupid dummies who were endowed with only skills and a portrait, but full-fledged individuals with their own history and opinions on various situations. Each of your companions will approve or, conversely, disagree with the decision you make while performing any task or simple conversation. This is responsible for the whole “Location” parameter, which you can always look in the character menu. If you want to become closer to your companion and, thanks to this, get new lines in dialogues, learn something new about him, gain an additional passive skill, or even have a love affair, then you must not only not do anything that he might not like, but but also to give various gifts that you can find or buy on your travels.

At the time the game was released, I remember discussions on forums from the series “Which of the fairer sex do you like best?” or “Who have you formed a gaming relationship with? (luckily the game allows this).”

Sound accompaniment

In my opinion, the soundtrack of the project was created at such a high level that all the melodies and elements of the voice acting do not stand out from the general atmosphere, but even complement it, taking immersion to a new level. I am sure that if you have spent a lot of time in this wonderful game, then you will immediately remember the title melody, which personally evokes in me some warm and pleasant emotions and a desire to plunge into this magical, but at the same time harsh and cruel world. I suggest you remember this song. Do you agree that she is very beautiful?

I will quote the words of the composer of “Dragon Age: Origins” – Inon Zur:

“From the very beginning, we tried not to be derivative, not wanting to follow famous films like The Lord of the Rings or other classic role-playing games. On the contrary, they tried to create a darker, aggressive direction that would distinguish this game from its predecessors. We wanted to come up with a fresh concept for a new story, and the music had to convey the essence of it. The starting point was a dark, twisted and evil fantasy environment. So I used some orchestrations and musical instruments familiar from the fantasy genre, but distorted them and made them darker, the melodies less harmonious, and the sounds more eerie and disturbing. Thus a new musical style was created.”

Interesting fact: alternative band Thirty Seconds to Mars actually presented their song This Is War from the album of the same name in Dragon Age: Origins. The debut of the track took place in the game, even before the release of the album itself.

Minuses

Having played Dragon Age: Origins today, I can say that it doesn’t have many flaws. It is well preserved after almost 15 years, various fan modifications make the picture even better. But a couple of things irritated me, albeit a little, during the game:

• Occasionally characters stumble, even when walking on a flat surface

• Sometimes during battle the artificial intelligence starts to glitch. This is expressed in the fact that the enemy can stand still and not act in any way until you hit him, and your party members periodically become blunt when attacking the opponent.

Why play?

A well-developed world and an exciting plot with many moral dilemmas and the ability to influence the fate of people, coupled with interesting gameplay. Add to this excellent partners and dialogues with great variability, in which you can find not only drama, but also a lot of humor. This game will not leave any RPG or dark fantasy fan indifferent.

Add-ons and mods

Almost immediately after the game’s release, downloadable add-ons began to appear. Typically, these were new storylines where you could explore the characters’ backstory even further, as well as get a unique character. Otherwise, as usual: locations, skills, items and tasks have been added – all of this, with rare exceptions, has a plot basis that allows you to become even more immersed in the world around you and learn a little more about its history.

Less than six months later, the Canadians from BioWare released the Awakening expansion, which provided the opportunity to take control of the Gray Wardens. Now you are allowed not only to complete additional tasks, advance through the plot and fight with various demonic (and not only) creatures, but also to build and protect your fortress and surrounding lands, extract resources (you could see something similar in the later Pillars of Eternity) and the search for new Gray Guardians. Depending on the ending of the original story, you can continue the game with your old hero or create a completely new one (immediately level 18). 6 new companions, additional specializations for each class, and many skills and spells were also added. The maximum hero level has been raised to 35, and equipment from 7 (in the original game) to 9 (in the expansion). In addition, three new skills have been introduced: rune making, permanent increase in health and stamina/mana.

In general, if you didn’t have enough of the gameplay and storyline of the main game, install “Awakening”, here you can find a new storyline, items and skills that will give you 15-20 hours of gameplay in total.

Today there are many mods that change the game both visually, gameplay, and plot. But, as a supporter of the pristine appearance of any project, I usually install those that only polish existing mechanics or improve the appearance. In the Telegram channel “Oldfag Gamer” I posted not only the original game with the Awakening expansion pack», but also many modifications that improve the graphics and fix some bugs and shortcomings that were missed when the official patches were prepared. The archive contains a patch that cures a RAM leak and forces the game to use 4 GB of RAM rather than 2 GB. In addition, you can find a quite useful (especially for a new player) mod that allows you to completely reset skills and characteristics if the selected class or skill does not suit you. I will not list and describe in detail here each of the modifications I have chosen, since I have already done all this in the instructions included with the assemblies (I described not only what exactly you are installing, but also how this can be done). I hope all this will help you return to your favorite game and experience a feeling of nostalgia!

Bottom line

Dragon Age: Origins is a game that, despite being almost 15 years old, still plays great today. It has an interesting plot, amazing live companions and great role-playing opportunities. You will laugh, be sad, the game will hardly leave you indifferent and uninterested, on the contrary, it will immerse you as much as possible in the events taking place on the screen. What else do you need for a great adventure in the world of dark fantasy?

I’ve been playing games for over 25 years and this is how I remember them: heartfelt and addictive, with fun mechanics and interactivity, without in-game currency or trying to be anything but a game. In my Telegram channel you will find not only reviews of games, but also current news, as well as discussions about game development. Join the oldfag community!