Dragon Age review

This is another answer that I gave on Yahoo.  The asker wanted to know whether Dragon Age: Origins was worth buying and this is what I gave as my answer.  I will flesh this out further when I carry on playing.  (I’ve temporarily traded it with a friend for Bioshock.)

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I bought the game as soon as it came out because I was amazed by the trailers. What the first answerer said is true - dialogue does take up a large portion of the game - but this is something I like very much. The voice acting (with the exception of the American dwarfs who painfully misuse the word 'sod') is top notch and the script is very funny but also very moving. Without spoiling the story, I would like to say that Alastair is quite possibly the wittiest video game character I've ever come across yet he can also be fairly heartbreaking.

I think the graphics are pretty good. There's certainly nothing that would cause me to complain. I think people are always expecting each game to completely obliterate anything before it with absolutely blinding graphics and that can make for some visually stunning yet otherwise bland games.

I can never make my mind up about the battle system because it's not what I'm used to from playing RPGs like Final Fantasy and Lost Odyssey. The battle system seems somewhat similar to Diablo's but more advanced and with the ability to pause during the action while you sort out your tactics.

The best thing about the game is the freedom you're given concerning your character and the storyline around them. You get a choice of how you want a conversation to progress which influences the events that follow. Sometimes you might just end up with a longer conversation with more witty remarks, sometimes you might earn yourself an important piece of equipment, or you might even decide whether a character lives or dies. The dialogue options are also different according to your gender and origin which makes the culture of the game world seem a lot more realistic. For example, trying to get information out of a human NPC might be more difficult if you are playing as an elf because there is a long-standing animosity between the two races.

Overall, Dragon Age is a very entertaining game and I would recommend it to you. If you want more information, look up the game on Gamespot.com but remember to look at more than just the site-produced review to get a good balance of opinion.