Dragon Age 2: The Age of “Awesome”

Nearing the approach of Dragon Age: Origins, a trailer was released. Blood billowed out from innumerate baddies with every sword-slash that shimmered its way across our field of view, beasts were slain en masse after charging headwards into shield-walls and a chick in her underwear partook in the kind of mutual caressing montage that always precedes a candle being suggestively blown out.  “This is the new shit”, we were cordially informed by Marilyn Manson as the game’s demographic raised two shoulders toward the sky in a baffled shrug.

After DA:O’s release it became apparent that the game had undergone a bizarre trailer disparity. Within Dragon Age: Origins is held a world of convincing depth and scale. Conversation feels organic; the amount of choice available on each dialogue tree results in a feeling of authenticity in your interactions with other characters. While there are certain limits set in place by the mere existence of a story within a game, you are still given a sense that you have the ability to influence and bend the outcome of segments of it to your own will. Weighing those decisions in your hands feels important and satisfying.

Gameplay requires a similar level of thoughtful involvement. Tactical methods of engagement are a requisite to defeating foes; pulling yourself up and out from an over-the-shoulder vantage point allows you to assess the situation and what is required of you and your party. The long-range might of archer and mage is tugged back from the frontline while swords, shields and maces are slung forward to clash with oncoming enemies. As you progress through the game, your talents and skills are upgraded and alongside these your methods of attack and counter-attack increase. More is demanded of you in order to survive and you are able to meet and defeat the increasing threats with careful allocation of each skill and a growing awareness of what is required to gain the upper hand.

Initial, whispered reports of Dragon Age 2 resulted in a general eyebrow ascent. Instead of having the ability to choose from a variety of classes and species (for whom the story had been tailored in DA:O), only a human character will be available. The ability to transport your character across game boundaries, as was satisfyingly demonstrated in another of Bioware’s RPG outings (the Mass Effect series) has therefore been rendered an impossibility. Meanwhile, the unwelcome dialogue-picture-wheel rolls its way into the room, leaving any requirement of lucid thought squished in its wake. Alas!

Still, after that trailer preceding the release of the initial Dragon Age, I was willing to grant some leniency to these unpleasant tidbits of new information and tried to avoid spending any time ruminating on them. I hoped that this was still, really, “the new shit” – same as the old shit; the good shit.

It was after seeing the garden variety hack’n slash showcased in the first Dragon Age 2 gameplay trailer that my heart truly sunk. “Wh- what have they done?” I mumbled in sad perplexity as I watched the swathes of skull-men crumble under the application of rapidly-applied steel. I could almost hear that A-button clacking away mindlessly underthumb. I played it myself at the Eurogamer Expo and my heart was essentially on the floor beneath me at that point, beating irregularly and making a real mess. I was apologetic but people were visibly repulsed. It felt like a completely different game; there was no challenge, no tactical involvement and no sense of achievement (although I have no doubt that this will be pingingly simulated on your platform of choice). The isometric view has apparently been ripped clean away from the PC version in a display of such mindless violence that assault charges seem inevitable. It’s especially cruel after the sweet-talking PC gamers received earlier in the year from Bioware regarding the benefits of building the game with them in mind.

David Silverman, Bioware’s head of marketing, recently revealed the now-infamous “motto” behind the development of Dragon Age 2 – “When you press a button, something awesome has to happen”. I responded to this with an animalistic, guttural series of vowel sounds and my palm became so firmly embedded into my face that I’m typing this with one hand.

I still hold out some hope that all of this is an elaborate ruse carefully crafted to be exponentially more effective than that DA:O trailer ever was for garnering attention and creating as a by-product a kind of ecstatic relief on the game’s final release. Dragon Age 2 will come to us quietly; we will walk through forests, meet old friends and orchestrate intricate attacks. The game will be more honed, more refined and deeper than the original was because that just makes sense; to add new layers of enjoyment, to create a further-faceted experience and to enhance something that was already great – not to decrease dimensionality like a möbius strip made out of paper being crushed carelessly underfoot.

… Right?